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THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


































































What do you suppose that ant-bear did? 










































The Bear Family At Home 

AND HOW THE CIRCUS CAME 
TO VISIT THEM 


By 

CURTIS D. WILBUR 

JJ 


Illustrated By 
W. R. LOHSE 


m 



INDIANAPOLIS 

THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 


Copyright, 1908, 1923 
By Curtis D. Wilbur 



Printed in the United States of America 


< , 
I e 


PRESS OF 

BRAUNWORTH & CO. 
BOOK MANUFACTURERS 
BROOKLYN, N. Y. 


OCT IS 1923 


©C1A759473 

'V* * 1 


Dedicated to the Memory of 
Ralph Gordon Wilbur 















✓ 




CONTENTS 


PAGE 

How the Little Cub Bear Got Back into the Woods Again . 2 

How the Monkey Went to School.6 

The Coming of the Great Big Animal and How He Helped 

the Bear Family.12 

The “Little-Cub-Bear-that-Would-Not-Mind-His-Papa” and 

How He Took an Unexpected Bath.22 

HOW THE “LiTTLE-CuB-BeAR-THAT-WOULD-NOT-MiND-HiS-PAPA” 

Was Nearly Drowned among the Logs.29 

The “Little-Cub-Bear-that-Would-Not-Mind-His-Papa” . . 36 

The Story of the “Little-Split-Nosed-Bear-that-Would-Not- 

Mind-His-Papa” .42 

The “One-Eared-Bear-that-Would-Not-Mind-His-Papa” . . 48 

The Lion’s Story of His Narrow Escape.55 

The True Story of How Ten Men Did Not Kill Club-Foot . 58 

The “Club-Foot-Bear-that-Would-Not-Mind-His-Papa”—A 

Great Smash-Up.68 

The Parrot’s Most Narrow Escape.73 

The “Little-Club-Foot-Bear-that-Would-Not-Mind-His-Papa” 

and the Dynamite.80 

The Coming of the Animal with the Long Nose .... 89 

The Monkey’s Story of His Most Narrow Escape .... 97 

The Story of the Little Bird’s Escape from the Alligator . 101 

How the Raccoon Was Caught.105 

The Animals Plan How They Will Defend Themselves 

against the Circus Men.112 

Jimmie Bear’s Story.116 

How the Circus Crossed the Ocean.124 

Out All Alone.131 

The Papa Bear’s Lullaby.139 


















THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 

And How the Circus Came to Visit Them 


O NCE a little cub bear was caught in a big log 
trap, and taken on a train to a circus. He lived 
in the circus a long, long while, and every day a 
great many people came to see the bear, and the 
lions, and the tigers, and the leopards, and the ele¬ 
phants, and the camels, and the other animals. 

Every night the animals would all be put in the 
wagons made for them, then the wagons would be 
rolled on the flat-cars of a railroad train. The train 
would go all night to another town, where a great 
many people would come to see the animals and the 
men and women in the circus. The Cub Bear saw a 
great many wonderful and strange things while he 
was in the circus and while traveling on the trains. 

Once he crossed the ocean in a great ship, and came 

* 

back again in another ship. This story tells: 

1 


HOW THE LITTLE CUB BEAR GOT BACK 
INTO THE WOODS AGAIN 


O NE night, after the wagons and the animals had 
all been put on board the cars, the fireman rang 
the bell, and the engineer started the train, and away 
it went, whistling and coughing down the track. The 
animals were so used to the train going rattle-te- 
bang, rattle-te-bang, all night long, that they all 
went to sleep, and remained asleep a long while. 
While the animals and every one on the train, ex¬ 
cept the engineer and the fireman, were asleep, the 
engineer looked ahead and suddenly saw a big rock 
on the track. He blew the whistle, “Toot-toot,” to 
call the brakemen, and the brakemen ran as fast as 
they could and began to put on the brakes to stop 
the train, but the train came nearer and nearer to 
the big rock. 

The poor engineer couldn’t stop the train, and the 
brakemen couldn’t stop the train, so the engine ran 
into the rock, and was knocked off the track, and 
turned a somersault, and was smashed all to pieces, 
and all the cars ran off the track into a ditch, and 
the wagons were all broken, so that the animals got 
out of their cages and found they were free in the 
dark woods. 

They were all so glad to be free that they ran 

2 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 3 


away as fast as they could and hid in the woods; all 
except the Cub Bear and a friend of his, a monkey 
named Jim. They ran a little way, and then the 
Cub Bear stopped and looked around. He saw a 
path, then he looked at the trees and the mountain 
and he thought he would wait there until morning. 
As soon as it was light the Cub Bear looked way up 
on the mountain side and saw a cave, and where 
do you suppose they were? In the very same forest 
where the Cub Bear was born. They walked a little 
way, and the Cub Bear said: 

“Why, here is the path where little brother Jim¬ 
mie Bear lost his foot in a trap.” 

They ran up that path as fast as they could to the 
cave in the mountains. The Cub Bear’s heart was 
beating very fast, pit-a-pat, pit-a-pat, because he 
knew that this was his old home, and he wondered 
whether his Papa Bear and Mamma Bear and his 
little Susie Bear and little brother Jimmie Bear were 
still there. They went in very quietly, and found a 
great big brown bear asleep. 

When the big brown bear heard them come in, he 
jumped up quickly and looked at little Cub Bear, 
and little Cub Bear looked at him. It was the Papa 
Bear! He ran to the Cub Bear and put his arms 
around him and gave him a great bear hug. You 
know bears can hug awfully tight. Papa Bear 
hugged the Cub Bear, and the Cub Bear hugged the 
Papa Bear, and they were very, very glad to see 


4 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


each other. The Papa Bear woke up the Mamma 
Bear, and then the Mamma Bear gave the Cub Bear 
a great bear hug, because she was so glad to see him. 
Susie Bear waked up and gave the little Cub Bear 
a big bear hug. But Jimmie Bear was not there. 
Did you ever give your papa a bear hug? 

After the Papa Bear and the Mamma Bear had 
talked a little while to the Cub Bear, they said, “We 
have something to show you,” and they took the Cub 
Bear away back into the back part of the cave and 
showed him the sweetest, cutest little baby bear you 
ever saw in your life, and the Papa Bear said: 

“We call this little baby bear ‘Cub Bear’ now. So 
we will have to call you ‘Circus Bear’ after this,” 
for the little Cub Bear had told his papa and mam¬ 
ma that he had been in the circus while away. 

All this time the monkey Jim had been sitting off 
by himself in the cave, watching the big bears. 
They were so big and strong that he was frightened, 
so he climbed up to the top of the cave, and there he 
stayed until the little Cub Bear waked up; and the 
Circus Bear didn’t know where he had gone. After 
a while the little wee Cub Bear waked up and saw 
the monkey, and said: 

“Oh, see that funny little man up there on the 
root. He has hair all over him, and he has a long 
tail, and he is making faces at me.” 

He asked the Circus Bear what it was, and the 
Circus Bear said: 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 5 


“It is a monkey, named Jim, a very dear friend 
of mine. Would you like to shake hands with him?” 
And the little Cub Bear said, “Yes.” 

So the Circus Bear told the monkey not to be 
afraid, and the monkey came down and shook hands 
with the little wee Cub Bear and they said they 
would always be good friends. The very first thing 
this little Cub Bear did was to ask the monkey to 
tell him a story, for he was the greatest bear for 
stories you ever saw. He was always teasing his 
papa and his mamma and everybody that came to 
the den, to tell him a story. The monkey said: 

“All right, I will tell you a story about the time 
that I went to school.” 

So that morning when the Papa and the Mamma 
Bear and the Circus Bear and the little Cub Bear 
were sitting in the den, the monkey told his story. 


HOW THE MONKEY WENT TO SCHOOL 


tt l\TOW> little Cub Bear, I am going to tell you 
-■ ^ about the time I went to school, the only time in 
my whole life that I went to school.” The little Cub 
Bear said he had never been to school in his life, 
and he would like to hear the story. 

The monkey Jim said: 

“Well, one night when we were riding on the 
train, going from one town where the circus had 
been, to another where they were going to give a 
show, I was riding in a wagon on one of the cars 
with a lot of other monkeys. The man who took 
care of the monkeys forgot and left a door open. A 
monkey named Joe and I climbed out through the 
open door and got on top of the wagon, and we just 
had a lot of fun, jumping around and playing with 
each other, and pulling each other’s hair and climb¬ 
ing down on the car. 

“After we had played a long while, the train went 
into a covered bridge, and I said to Joe, ‘Let’s jump 
up and see if we can catch hold of one of those iron 
rods.’ He said, ‘All right,’ and we gave a great 
jump, and we caught hold of an iron rod overhead. 
The train was going so fast that we almost missed 
the rod, but we hung on, and in a moment when we 
looked down, what do you suppose had happened? 



HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 7 


The train had run out from under us, and there was 
nothing under us except the railway track and ties, 
and, away down below them a deep, dark river. We 
were frightened, because it was very dark and very 
cold. We climbed down as fast as we could, and 
walked across the ties, until we came to the ground. 

“There were a lot of trees near the track, and we 
ran over as quickly as we could and climbed a tree, 
but it was very, very cold. We hugged each other 
very tight and tried to keep warm, but it grew 
colder, and colder, and colder, until it seemed as 
though we would freeze, for you know we had 
always lived in a very warm country, until we came 
to the circus. By and by, though, it commenced to 
get light, and when we looked over in the woods a 
little farther, we saw a little red school house. By 
and by a man, who took care of the little red school 
house, came and opened the door and went inside. 
Pretty soon we saw the smoke coming out of the 
chimney, for the man had built a fire. 

“Joe said to me, ‘Let’s go down as quickly as we 
can and run over there, and see if we can get warm 
bv the fire.’ So we climbed down the tree, and ran 
as fast as we could to the little red school house. 
There we found a window open a little way, and we 
climbed up and went inside the school house. The 
man wasn’t looking, so we hurried over near the 
stove, and Joe climbed into one desk where a boy kept 
his books, and I climbed into another desk where a 


8 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


girl kept her books. The man looked around quickly, 
for he thought he heard something, but we kept so 
quiet that he didn’t see us. By and by he closed the 
window, went out and shut the door, and there we 
were locked up in that little red school house! But 
the fire was so nice and warm that we were glad to 
be there. 

“Pretty soon Joe said, 'Let’s go out and see if we 
can find something to eat;’ so we got out and looked 
all over the building. We opened the drawer in the 
teacher’s desk, and in it we found an apple that he 
had taken away from a little boy in school the day 
before, for you know that little boys are not allowed 
to have apples in school. I gave Joe the biggest part 
of the apple, and we ate it all up; and just as we had 
eaten it up, a great big boy came to the door and 
made such a noise that we scampered back and got 
into the desks. We stayed there very quietly. 

“Pretty soon another boy came, and then another, 
and then another, and then a girl came, and by and 
by all the scholars had come. Some of them were 
playing in the yard, and some of them in the room, 
and just then the teacher came. He rang the bell, 
'Ding-dong, ding-dong, ding-dong,’ and the pupils 
came into the school room and took their seats. 
Then the teacher struck a small bell, and the pupils 
sat up very straight and sang a song. Just then I 
reached out and grabbed the ear of the boy who was 
sitting in my seat, and pulled it very hard. He 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 9 


screamed, ‘Ouch, ouch!’ And just then Joe reached 
out and pulled the hair of the girl that was sitting 
in his seat, and she screamed, ‘Ouch, ouch!’ The 
teacher pounded the desk and cried, ‘Order, order!’ 
The little boy thought it was the boy behind him 
that pulled his ear, and the little girl thought it was 
the girl behind her that pulled her hair. 

“When everything was still again, the teacher 
told the boys and girls to take out their books. The 
boy reached in to get his book and I bit his finger, 
and he yelled ‘Ouch!’ just as loud as he could, and 
jumped out of his seat. And the little girl reached 
in to get her book, and Joe bit her finger, and she 
yelled ‘Ouch!’ just as loud as she could, and jumped 
out. All the pupils looked over to see what was the 
trouble; but we kept very still, and the teacher came 
down quickly to find out what caused the trouble. 
He reached his hand into the desk quickly, and I 
grabbed hold of his hand and hung on. Then he 
jerked his hand out, and I came out with it, and I 
jumped on his shoulders and began to pull his hair; 
and Joe jumped out of his desk, and he jumped on 
the teacher’s shoulders, and the teacher yelled and 
tried to hit us with a stick, and we jumped over on to 
the teacher’s desk, and then we jumped over the 
pupils’ heads. I jumped out of the window, and Joe 
ran out of the door, and as he ran out he took one of 
the boys’ dinner pails with him. They all screamed 
and yelled and ran after us as fast as they could. 


10 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


“We ran over to a tree, and a couple of dogs saw 
us, and they barked and barked, and ran after us. 
The boys threw stones, but none of them could hit 
us, and pretty soon we got to a tree. We scampered 
up as fast as we could, and all the pupils, and the 
teacher, and the dogs, came to the foot of the tree, 
and the dogs barked, and the boys yelled and threw 
stones, and the girls danced and shouted. The 
teacher had something that looked like a gun, but I 
think it was only a stick, because he didn’t shoot at 
all. Just then Joe reached into the dinner pail, and 
he found a soft boiled egg. He threw this down at 
the teacher and hit him right on top of his bald head. 

“Then we scampered out on the branches, and 
jumped into another tree, and then into another 
tree, and then into another tree, and pretty soon we 
had gone so far that they couldn’t find us. Then we 
opened the dinner pail, and we found a fine dinner, 
some apples, and nuts, and bread and butter, and a 
piece of pie. When we had eaten everything there 
was in the pail, we left the pail up in the tree, and 
climbed down to the ground. Then we walked and 
we ran, until we came to a town, and there was the 
circus tent. For this was the very town where the 
circus was going to show! We ran as fast as we 
could, and a lot of dogs got after us. They barked 
and barked, but we got away from all the dogs but 
one, because he could run faster than the others. 
He was a very little dog, and when he came close to 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 11 


us, Joe ran to one side of the road and I ran to the 
other, and just as he got between us, we grabbed the 
dog by his tail and his ears, and pulled so hard that 
he just yelled, ‘Ki-yi, ki-yi, ki-yi!’ and ran toward 
the tent as fast as he could; so we both jumped on 
his back and rode until we came to the tent. Then 
we jumped off and scampered into the tent under 
the canvas and found our wagon. The door was still 
open, and we got into the wagon, and there we went 
to sleep, for we had been up all night. 

“That is the way I went to school,” said the mon¬ 
key. 

And the little Cub Bear said, “I will be glad when 
I am big enough to go to school.” 


THE COMING OF THE GREAT BIG ANIMAL 
AND HOW HE HELPED THE 
BEAR FAMILY 


A FTER the monkey had finished his story, Papa 
Bear and Mamma Bear and the little Cub Bear 
were talking about the animals in the circus,, and 
the little Cub Bear said, “I wonder where all those 
animals are?” 

And the Circus Bear said, “Why, I think they are 
somewhere in the woods.” 

Then the little Cub Bear said, “Maybe these ani¬ 
mals will come to see us. I think it would be fine 
if we had a nice large cave, big enough for all the 
animals.” 

The Mamma Bear said, “I think that would be 
nice,” and the Papa Bear said, “That would be 
nice,” and the little Circus Bear said, “I think that 
would be nice, too,” and the Cub Bear said, “Maybe 
we can have a bigger cave, and have all the animals 
come and live with us.” 

And just as he said it they heard a rustling sound, 
as though something was coming up the path. The 
little Cub Bear ran to the mouth of the cave and 
said: 

“There is a very strange looking animal coming 

up the path. It is the biggest animal I ever saw. It 

12 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 13 


has a nose that reaches clear to the ground, and it 
has a thumb and finger on the end of its nose, and 
every once in a while it stops and picks up a piece 
of straw with the thumb and finger and puts it into 
its great mouth. It has teeth that are so long that 
they stick way out of its mouth. The teeth are as 
large as a small tree, and look like great sharp 
horns growing out of its mouth, and its legs are as 
big around as a large stump. Its ears are as large 
as the mouth of this cave. It can move its nose 
around and scratch its back with the thumb and 
finger on the end of its nose. It has no hair at all 
except on the end of its tail.” 

Just then the animal made a tremendous noise, a 
sort of a blowing and trumpeting sound. 

The Circus Bear said, “I know who that is; it is 
Jumbo, the elephant from our show. Ask him to 
come into the cave.” 

Jumbo came to the mouth of the cave, and the 
little Cub Bear said to him very politely, “Come in, 
Mr. Jumbo!” But of course Jumbo could not come 
into the cave; it was too small. Mr. Jumbo said: 

“I would like to come into the cave and see the 
Circus Bear, because he was very good to me when 
we were in the circus together.” 

So the little Cub Bear said, “Try and see if you 
can not make the mouth of the cave larger.” 

Mr. Jumbo said, “I will try.” 

So Mr. Jumbo commenced to dig with his great 


14 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


tusks and pull with his great trunk at the dirt and 
stones and the roots that were in the way, until the 
mouth of the cave was ever so much larger than it 
had been, but it was still too small for the elephant 
to get in; so the Circus Bear came to the mouth of 
the cave and told Jumbo how glad he was to see him. 
Mr. Jumbo took hold of the Circus Bear’s foot with 
his trunk and shook it, just like two people shaking 
hands. He was so glad to see the bear that had been 
so good to get things for him when he was in the 
circus, for there he was tied to a stake by a great 
chain. (That is the way they keep elephants with 
the circus, you know.) 

When Mr. Jumbo found that he could not get into 
the cave, he said to the Circus Bear and to all of the 
bears, “You know that the other animals are trying 
to find this cave, and as soon as they find it they will 
want to live here, and we ought to get the cave ready 
for them.” 

Then the Papa Bear said, “What do you think 
that we ought to do? Do you think that we could 
make the cave larger for all of the animals?” 

Mr. Jumbo said, “Well, I think the first thing we 
ought to do is to go down to the wreck of the train 
and get some of the things that we want from the 
wreck, before the men come back and take every¬ 
thing away.” 

All of the bears, and the monkey, thought that 
was the best thing they could do. They went down 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 15 


right away, and found that all of the animals had 
gone, but there were lots of things that they wanted 
to take up to the cave. Mr. Jumbo found the beauti¬ 
ful howdah that the circus man used to place on his 
back. 

A howdah, you know, is that big saddle they put 
on an elephant’s back for the people to ride in. It 
was painted with red and yellow paint, and had 
beautiful red plush cushions in it. It had a top to 
keep the sun off of any one that was riding in the 
howdah, on the elephant’s back. The bears said that 
they could put the howdah on the elephant’s back, 
but that they could not fasten it there, for they had 
no hands to buckle the straps with. 

Then the monkey said, “I can fasten the buckles 
with my hands, for you know that I have fingers 
just like a man, and a man buckles the straps by 
using his fingers.” 

The Papa Bear and the Mamma Bear, Susie Bear, 
the Circus Bear, and the little Cub Bear lifted as 
hard as they could, but of course they could not lift 
the heavy howdah way up on Mr. Jumbo’s back, for 
they were not tall enough, so Mr. Jumbo said, “I 
will kneel down, and then you will not have to lift so 
far, and I can help you with my trunk.” 

So he knelt, and the bears all lifted at once, and 
Mr. Jumbo helped them with his trunk, and finally 
they got the howdah in the right place on his back. 
Then the monkey buckled the straps, and everything 


16 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


was ready to take the howdah up to the cave, where 
the bears live. 

The Papa Bear said, “Let us fill the howdah with 
the things we want to take up to the cave.” And 
they commenced to hunt for the things that they 
wanted, and what do you think they found? A great 
bass drum, so big that a little bear could get into it; 
and they also found a smaller drum, and a fife and 
some big brass horns that belonged to the band. 
Then they found some harness that was used for the 
beautiful black and white horses that ran the char¬ 
iot races. They put all of these things into the 
howdah. 

When the howdah was nearly full, the little Cub 
Bear asked his papa if he couldn't ride in the how¬ 
dah. Mr. Jumbo heard the little Cub Bear ask, and 
he said it would be all right, because he was very 
strong and could carry a great deal more than they 
had put on his back. When the little Cub Bear 
climbed into the howdah, Mr. Jumbo straightened 
out his front legs to get up, and the little Cub Bear 
nearly tipped out of the rear end of the howdah; 
and then he straightened his hind legs and stood up, 
and the little Cub Bear nearly fell out again. 

Just as they started up the hill, the monkey said, 
“You need a driver;" and he grasped Mr. Jumbo's 
tail and climbed up the tail just as if he were going 
up a tree; then he scampered along Mr. Jumbo's 
back, clear over the top of the howdah, until he sat 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 17 


right on top of Mr. Jumbo’s head, just as the drivers 
do, when they drive elephants. Then the monkey 
asked Mr. Jumbo to hand him a stick with a sharp 
hook in the end of it, that the drivers used to guide 
the elephants with. Mr. Jumbo reached over with 
his long nose that had a thumb and finger on the end 
of it, and picked up the stick and handed it up to the 
monkey, for he knew the monkey was not strong 
enough to hurt him much. 

The monkey said very proudly, “Get up, Mr. 
Jumbo,” and away they went to the bears’ cave. 
When they got there, Mr. Jumbo knelt down, and 
the little bear nearly tumbled out again, but he 
jumped out all right, and they took the howdah off 
Mr. Jumbo’s back. The bears and monkey took every¬ 
thing out of the howdah and carried it into the cave. 

Then the animals all went back again to the place 
where the train was wrecked, to see if there was 
anything else they could get. This time they found 
a chariot, that had two wheels, and it was all cov¬ 
ered with gilt and with angels made of gold, and it 
was very, very beautiful. Mr. Jumbo said that if 
the bears and the monkey could hitch him to the 
chariot, they could fill it with things and take them 
up to the den. So they looked and looked, and finally 
found a harness, that was used for the elephant. 
The monkey and the bears harnessed Mr. Jumbo to 
the chariot, and then they looked for things to put 
into the chariot. 


18 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


The monkey found the clothes that he used to 
wear in the circus—a pair of red trousers, with a 
green coat, and a little red hat with a black feather 
in it, and he put them in the chariot. Mr. Jumbo 
found a bale of hay, but they all said that would 
have to wait until the next time, because there 
would not be room in the chariot for this bale of hay 
and the other things they wanted to take up. They 
found the little drum that the monkey used to play 
on in the circus, and put that in the chariot. Then 
they found a lot of biscuits that the dog in the circus 
had to eat, and they put these in the chariot, too. 
And soon the chariot was full. 

The little Cub Bear thought there was just room 
enough for him to ride in the chariot, and he asked 
Mr. Jumbo if he could ride; and as soon as Mr. 
Jumbo said “Yes,” he climbed in on top of the things 
in the chariot, and they all started up to the cave. 
They had not gone very far before the monkey got 
hold of Mr. Jumbo’s tail and scampered up to his 
place on top of Mr. Jumbo’s head. They soon 
reached the cave, and there they unhitched Mr. 
Jumbo and left the chariot and all the things in it, 
and went back to the train wreck, because they 
knew that there was another chariot there even 
more beautiful than this one; and when they 
reached the wreck again, Mr. Jumbo went over to 
where the big bale of hay was; and how do you sup¬ 
pose he carried the bale of hay? 



Mr. Jumbo reached over and picked up the stick 

































HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 19 


He knelt down, and he ran his great teeth, called 
tusks, under the bale of hay, then he wrapped his 
long nose, or trunk, as it is called, around the bale, 
and stood up and carried the hay over and put it in 
the chariot. Then he went for two more bales in 
the same way, and placed them in the chariot. The 
monkey then hitched Mr. Jumbo to the chariot, and 
they again started up the hill. In this way they 
hauled two or three loads of hay, and then they un¬ 
hitched Mr. Jumbo and left the chariot up near the 
bears’ cave. 

Then the bears, the monkey, and the elephant 
went back to the wreck, and each one carried every¬ 
thing he could. The bears got their arms full, and 
walked all the way up to the den on their hind legs. 
The monkey got his little arms full—of what do you 
suppose? Bags of roasted peanuts. The elephant 
carried up three great sacks filled with barley. They 
worked so hard that it took them nearly all day. 

That night as they were wondering whether any 
of the animals would find the cave in the dark, they 
suddenly heard the flapping of wings. The little 
Cub Bear ran at once to the mouth of the cave to see 
what it was. 

“Oh! Circus Bear,” he said, “here is a great bird. 
He has great big eyes as large as marbles. He has 
the funniest pointed ears. He has a hook nose; he 
has great claws, and he is as big as half a dozen 
doves.” 


20 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


The Circus Bear said, “That is Mr. Owl. Ask 
him to come in.” 

So the little Cub Bear said to the owl very po¬ 
litely, “Come in, Mr. Owl,” and the owl came into 
the den. 

He blinked his great eyes, and looked solemn and 
wise, and the little Cub Bear said, “Mr. Owl, we are 
going to build a house, so that all the animals can 
come to live with us if they want to, and we want to 
know if you can help us to build the house.” 

And Mr. Owl said, very solemnly, “I would be 
very glad to help you, because when we lived in the 
circus, your brother was very good to me, and I 
should like to do anything I can to help you.” 

The little Cub Bear said, “What can you do?” 

And the owl said, “If you want me to I can be 
door-keeper, and when any one comes I can ask who 
he is, because, you know, I can say, ‘Who-o-o? 
who-o-o?’ ” 

The little Cub Bear danced up and down, and said 
that would be very fine. And he said, “I am very 
glad that my brother was kind to you when you 
were in the circus.” 

So the owl went out to the mouth of the den, and 
there was a great big tree, and away up near the top 
of the tree was a long limb sticking out like an arm, 
and the owl flew up to this limb and sat there, look¬ 
ing very solemn and very wise, as all owls do, blink¬ 
ing his great eyes. And there he sat day and night, 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 21 


winking and blinking his great eyes, so solemn and 
wise, keeping watch for the bears and the animals, 
just like a soldier sentry standing guard at the Gen¬ 
eral’s tent. 

Now the little Cub Bear, like all little cubs, was 
very fond of stories, and was always teasing the 
Papa Bear to tell him stories about little bears, and 
all sorts of things. The little bear liked the stories 
that his papa told him about the “Little-Cub-Bear- 
that-would-not-mind-his-papa.” 

That night after the owl had flown up to the limb 
of the dead tree, the little fellow said, “Papa, please 
tell me another story about the ‘Little-Cub-Bear- 
that-would-not-mind-his papa.’ ” 

The Papa Bear said, “Little one, you are always 
asking me to tell you stories; it is hard for me to 
think of so many, but if you want me to do so, I will 
tell you of: 


THE “LITTLE-CUB-BE AR-TH AT-WOULD- 
NOT-MIND-HIS-PAPA” AND HOW HE 
TOOK AN UNEXPECTED BATH 


<*(JT 1THIS ‘Little-Cub-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his- 

JL papa’ was a tame little bear that lived with his 
papa near a great saw-mill. You know what a saw¬ 
mill is? It is a place where they take great pine trees 
that have been chopped down and cut up into logs, 
and saw the logs into boards, and shingles and lum¬ 
ber, to make houses for men to live in, with their 
little cubs, that they call ‘boys’ and ‘girls’ and their 
little wee cubs they call ‘babies.’ This saw-mill was 
on a great river, and near the saw-mill was a place 
where the water fell straight down from a place 
higher than this house, and of course the stream ran 
very swiftly above the falls and below the falls. 
These falls were not so large as the Niagara Falls, 
but they were so large that the water poured over 
with a great roaring sound, and the water whirled 
about, after it reached the bottom of the falls, and 
great waves dashed up against the banks of the 
river. 

“Above the falls, the water ran so swiftly that 
no one could swim in it. The Papa Bear knew this, 
but the ‘Little-Cub-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his- 

22 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 23 


papa’ didn’t know that the water ran so swiftly. 
The Papa Bear had told his little son many, many 
times not to go too near the river, and never to try 
to drink out of the river, above the falls. 

“But one day the little fellow was very, very 
thirsty, and he ran up to the bank of the river, and 
saw the beautiful, cool water, and thought how nice 
it would be to have a drink. He was so thirsty he 
didn’t want to go away down below the falls, where 
he and his papa usually took a drink of water, so he 
thought he would see if he couldn’t get a drink right 
where he was, there above the falls. He went down 
to the very edge and reached way over and began to 
lap up the water, and, oh! how good it was. Just 
then he heard a noise, and as he looked up quickly, 
his foot slipped, and into the river he went, ker- 
splash! 

“Now, this little bear could swim. That is one 
reason he wasn’t afraid to drink from the river, be¬ 
cause he thought if he fell in, he could swim out very 
easily and very quickly, so he started to swim as 
hard as he could for the shore, but he soon found 
that the water was so swift, that instead of getting 
nearer the shore, he was getting farther and far¬ 
ther away all the time. And then he looked around 
to see where he was going. He found that he was 
going nearer and nearer to the falls, where the wa¬ 
ter went over with such a great roar, so he swam 
harder and harder and harder, and faster and 


24 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


faster and faster, but all the time he was going 
closer and closer to the terrible falls! Finally the 
little bear gave up trying to swim out, and just kept 
his nose out of the water, so that he could breathe, 
and down the stream he went faster than you could 
run. Sometimes great waves would cover him up 
completely, and when his nose would come up above 
the water, he would blow almost like a whale, to get 
the water out of his nose. Almost before you could 
think, that little bear came to the edge of the falls, 
and over he went! 

“Do you think that was the last of him? Well, if 
he had been a little boy, I suppose he would have 
been drowned; but this little Cub Bear was so light 
and so strong, that after a long, long while, he came 
up to the surface of the water, right in the middle 
of a great whirlpool. He went round and round and 
round in the water, and it seemed as though he 
never would stop. But finally, he found a big log 
that had come over the falls, and he got one foreleg 
over the log, and swam as hard as he could toward 
the bank, and finally succeeded in getting ashore. 

“There he lay on the grass, all wet and tired out, 
and all he could think was, ‘I am so glad I wasn’t 
drowned. I will never again disobey my papa.’ 
And he thought this over and over in his mind. Soon 
the ‘Little-Cub-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his-papa’ 
went to sleep right where he was, for he was too 
tired to go home. 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 25 


“After a long while, his papa began to look for 
him, and Anally found him lying there all wet, and 
sound asleep. His papa knew what had happened, 
but he felt so bad he didn’t waken the little bear, but 
picked him up in his great arms and carried him 
back to the den and laid down close beside him to 
keep him warm. And the little fellow slept all that 
night, and all the next day, until four o’clock in the 
afternoon. 

“Then he wakened and put his arm around his 
papa and said, ‘Oh, I had the most terrible dream 
in the whole world. I thought I was nearly drowned, 
and I was too tired to get home.’ 

“And the Papa Bear said, ‘I guess that wasn’t a 
dream, but I am so glad that you are alive, that I 
am not going to scold you for disobeying me.’ ” 

When this story about the “Little-Cub-Bear-that- 
would-not-mind-his-papa” was Anished, our little 
Cub Bear, who lived away up in the cave in the 
mountain, said, “I should think that every little bear 
ought to mind his papa and do just as he says, else 
they might get drowned, you know.” 

Then the little bear went off to bed and to sleep. 

The next morning early the little Cub Bear got up 
and rubbed his eyes with his paws, instead of wash¬ 
ing them as little boys do. 

Just then he heard a noise as if some animal was 
coming, and he ran to the mouth of the den and 
looked out, and said: 


26 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


"I see the queerest looking animal coming up the 
path. It has long ears and a great big mouth, and a 
queer looking tail, and looks something like a horse, 
but still it looks different from a horse.” 

And just then the owl saw the animal and said, 
“Who-o-o? who-o-o?” and the animal answered, 
“Hee-haw, hee-haw, hee-haw.” 

And the Circus Bear said, “I know who that is. 
That is a mule. Her name is Jenny.” 

Just then Jenny came to the mouth of the den, 
and the little Cub Bear said, very politely, “Come 
in, Mrs. Jenny.” 

And she came into the den, and the little Cub 
Bear said, “Mrs. Jenny, we are going to try to 
build a house big enough for all the animals, so if 
they come to see us we will have a place for them 
to stay. Can you help us?” 

Then Mrs. Jenny said, “I would be very glad to, 
because your brother was very good to me when we 
were in the circus.” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “What can you do?” 

And Jenny said, “I haven’t worked for a long 
while, but I can kick like everything.” 

The little Cub Bear said, “Well, here is a soft place 
in the rock. Perhaps if you will kick, it will fall 
down and make more room.” 

And Jenny turned around and kicked the rock, 
and it fell down, and she kicked and she kicked, and 
more rocks fell down; and she kicked, and more rocks 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 27 


fell down; and she kept on kicking, and more rocks 
fell down, and the bears picked up the rocks and car¬ 
ried them out, and when she got through there was a 
nice large room. 

And the little Cub Bear said, “We will call this 
Jenny’s room. I am very glad that my brother was 
good to Mrs. Jenny when she was in the circus, be¬ 
cause if he hadn’t been, maybe she would have kicked 
me instead of the rocks.” 

That day the bears worked hard all day trying to 
find enough to eat for themselves and for all of the 
animals that were coming to see them from the cir¬ 
cus. The Circus Bear told them just what things 
the animals liked to eat; so the Papa Bear and Susie 
Bear went one way and the Mamma Bear went an¬ 
other. The elephant looked all over the mountain, to 
see if he could find some grass to eat. 

That night, when the animals came to the cave, the 
elephant told them that he thought he had found a 
fine place for the animals that liked to eat grass. He 
said there were a great many horses where he found 
the grass, but that they said they were not going to 
come with him because they did not want to live in a 
cave. They said they wanted to live out in the open 
air; and that if any one came to take them back to the 
circus, they would run away as fast as they could. 

The bears were very tired that night, but the little 
Cub Bear teased his papa for a story about the “Lit- 
tle-Cub-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his-papa.” Final- 


28 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


ly the Papa Bear said that he would tell just one 
story, if the Cub Bear would promise that he would 
not ask for another one, and would go to bed as soon 
as the story was finished. So the little Cub Bear and 
Susie Bear came as close as they could to the Papa 
Bear, and he told this story: 


HOW “LITTLE-CUB-BEAR-THAT-WOULD- 
NOT-MIND-HIS-PAPA” WAS NEARLY 
DROWNED AMONG THE LOGS 


4<»TUST on the edge of the stream which flowed 

J by the saw-mill where the ‘Little-Cub-Bear- 
that-would-not-mind-his-papa’ lived, there was a 
pond of still water, and in this pond there were a 
great many logs that floated down from the forest 
away up the river. These logs were in this pond 
waiting to be sawed up into boards and timber, to 
be used in building houses. Now, this was a very 
dangerous place for little boys, and for little bears. 
The Papa Bear had told his little son never to go 
out on the logs, and the little fellow had promised 
that he never would go out on the logs. But, day 
after day, the little Cub Bear saw men going out on 
the logs with long sticks that had big spikes in the 
end of them, and long sticks with hooks on the end 
of them; and they pushed the logs here and there, to 
bring them over to the saw-mill, where they were 
hoisted into the mills by great chains, and then were 
moved over in front of a great saw to be sawed into 
lumber. 

“As the little Cub Bear watched these men every 
day he would think how easy it was, and how nice 

it was to ride around on those logs, and to step 

29 


30 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


from one log to another, and how foolish his papa 
was to tell him not to go down on the logs, when 
it was so easy. 

“One day after watching the men for a long 
while, the little Cub Bear thought he would go 
down very, very carefully and walk out on one of 
the logs, and this he did. There he waited for 
a long while, sitting on the log. It was great fun, 
and didn’t hurt at all, so finally he stepped over 
on to another log, and then on to another. My! 
how he enjoyed it. The little bear felt sure that 
his papa had make a great mistake in telling him 
to keep off the logs. 

“Just then, as the little bear stepped from one 
log to another, both logs rolled, and down he went 
into the water. But he didn’t mind that much 
because he could swim very well. The little bear 
swam to the surface as quickly as he could, but 
instead of getting his head out of the water, he 
bumped his head into the logs, for the surface of 
the water was all covered with floating logs. 

“Then the little bear saw why his papa had told 
him never to play on the logs, because if he once 
fell into the river, he was very apt to be drowned. 
The little Cub Bear didn’t give up and drown like 
that. He began to swim as hard as he could, 
and held his breath as long as he could, and after 
he had swum just as far as he possibly could, 
he came up to the surface again, and this time his 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 31 


nose came out between two logs, and there was 
just room enough for his nose to get up out of the 
water, so he had a chance to breath again. And 
oh, how good it seemed. And he took such long, 
deep breaths, and it seemed as though he could 
never get enough air. Then he thought he would 
see if he couldn’t find a way out, and he tried 
and tried, but there wasn’t room between the logs 
for his head to come up out of the water. He 
couldn’t even get his eyes above the surface of the 
water, and so he couldn’t see where he was. Pretty 
soon the logs began to move closer and closer to¬ 
gether, and then he knew if he stayed where he 
was he would surely be killed. So he took a long 
breath, just as deep a breath as he could. 

“Can you take a long, deep breath, little Cub 
Bear?” (And the little Cub Bear said, “Yes, papa,” 
and he took a long, deep breath to show his papa 
how the little bear breathed when he just had his 
nose above the water.) 

“Then the little bear dropped down again under 
the water, and he swam as hard and fast as he 
could, hoping that the next time he came up he 
might possibly find another place where he could 
breathe. He knew that if he did not, he surely 
would be drowned and would never see his papa 
again. 

“When the little Cub Bear came up, he found 
a place just big enough for his nose, and again he 


32 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


took a very long breath, and waited until the logs 
began to come together again, then he dropped 
down and swam under the logs. And as he was 
swimming he could feel the logs scrape his back, 
and he knew that he was still underneath the great 
log raft. 

“Finally, just as he had to breathe anyway, 
whether he breathed water and drowned, or 
breathed air and lived, he saw a little light place 
under the water where the light shone down be¬ 
tween the logs and he swam to the surface, and 
this time his whole head came out of the water, and 
he got a deep breath of fresh air, and another 
and another, but he couldn’t get out. He stayed 
there, and pretty soon he found that the logs were 
moving apart just a little bit at a time, so that 
his head could come up farther and farther. And 
finally he got his whole back out of the water. Then 
the logs moved so that the little bear was able to 
crawl clear out of the water; and there he lay on 
the logs, tired out, and it was a long, long time 
before he could move or walk or do a thing. He 
was terribly frightened. But after a while, he 
managed to walk clear to the shore on the logs, 
and he was very careful not to fall in the water 
again. He walked home and lay down and went 
to sleep. His papa came home after a while with 
something to eat for supper. He shook the little 
bear, but the little bear was so tired he didn’t 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 33 


wake up. And so his papa let him sleep all 
night.” 

When the Papa Bear had finished telling his 
little cub the story about the “Little-Cub-Bear- 
that-would-not-mind-his-papa,” he said: “Little Cub 
Bear, what do you think of this story?” 

And our little Cub Bear scratched his head, and 
thought quite a long while, and then he said, 
“I think it is best to try, try again, and not to give 
up too easily, or you might get drowned.” 

The Papa Bear said, “I think so, too, little 
Cub Bear. Now, run to bed and go to sleep.” 

So the little bear went to bed, and went to sleep. 
During the night he seemed to be dreaming. He 
moved his paws just as though he was swimming, 
and then he snorted like a whale, and took long, 
deep breaths, and then he moved his paws again, 
and then he breathed deep breaths again, and 
finally he sighed a great sigh, and slept quietly. 
The little bear was dreaming about something? 
Can you guess what it was? 

The next morning the little Cub Bear waked up 
early and wondered if any other animal would come 
from the circus. He rubbed his eyes and listened. 

Just then he heard a sound of small hoofs patter¬ 
ing along the path. The little Cub Bear ran to 
the mouth of the cave and looked down to see what 
it was, and he saw something white. He said: 

“I see something coming up the path. It looks 


34 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


something like a sheep, but has long, straight horns, 
and it has a beard, and long, straight hair.” 

Just then the owl saw the animal, and said, 
“Who-o-o? who-o-o?” 

And the animal answered, “Ba-a-a, ba-a-a.” And 
the Circus Bear said, “I know who that is; that 
is Billy the goat;” and just then the goat came 
to the mouth of the den, and the little Cub Bear 
said, very politely, “Come in, Mr. Goat,” and the 
goat came in, and he looked around and saw the 
Circus Bear and the big bears. 

The little Cub Bear said to him, “Mr. Goat, 
we are going to try to build a house large enough 
for all the animals, so if they come to see us we will 
have a place for them to stay.” 

And the goat said, “I will be very glad to help 
you in any way I can, because your brother was 
very good to me when we were in the circus.” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “What can you do?” 

And the goat said, “I don’t know. I can butt 
like everything.” 

And then the little Cub Bear said, “Well, there 
is a very soft place in the ground, perhaps you 
can knock some of the dirt and rocks down, so 
we can carry it out and make more room.” 

And then the goat said, “All right;” and he 
butted, and he butted, and he butted, and knocked 
down more dirt, and they carried it out, and he 
kept on and butted and butted and butted, and 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 35 


when he got through butting, there was a fine large 
room. 

And the Cub Bear said, “Thank you. We 
will call this room Billy’s room. I am very glad 
that my brother was good to Billy when he was 
in the circus, because if he hadn’t been, maybe 
Billy would have butted me instead of the rocks.” 

The animals worked hard all that day trying 
to make the cave bigger. They scratched and dug 
the dirt, and the rocks, and worked as hard as 
they possibly could, for they were sure that soon 
the animals would be there and the cave would 
not be large enough. 

At night they all sat down and rested, and 
just as soon as the Papa Bear was seated, the 
little Cub Bear ran over to him and asked for 
another story about the “Little-Cub-Bear-that- 
would-not-mind-his-papa.” The Papa Bear was 
very tired, but he loved the dear little cub, and 
so he began the story: 


THE “LITTLE-CUB-BEAR-THAT-WOULD- 
NOT-MIND-HIS-PAPA” 

U A SAW-MILL, you know, is a very dangerous 
place for any little bear to play, because there 
are so many saws and knives and wheels, whirling 
around in every direction. This little bear, you re¬ 
member, lived near a saw-mill, and belonged to his 
papa, who belonged to the man that owned the mill. 

“The Papa Bear told the little bear not to 
touch anything in the saw-mill, for if he did he 

would be sure to be hurt. The little bear said 

that he would not touch a single thing, for he 
didn’t want to be hurt any more than his papa 

wanted him to be hurt. So the Papa Bear said 

that he would rather that his little bear would 
stay away from the mill; but the little bear teased 
so hard, that finally the Papa Bear told him he 
could go into the mill if he would be sure not to 
touch a single thing . The little bear said that he 
would be very careful, so Papa Bear let him go 
into the saw-mill, where all of the wheels were 
going around and around. My! How the little 
bear did enjoy the mill. 

“The great wheels and saws were going around 
so fast, with a whir-r-r-r, whir-r-r-r, and buz-z-z-z, 
buz-z-z-z. The great saws looked like shining 

36 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 37 


wheels, and they went around so quickly that you 
could not see their teeth at all. A big log would 
come up to the saw on a sort of a carriage, and 
then buz-z-z-z, buz-z-z-z the saw would go clear 
through the big log from one end to the other, and 
before the little bear could think, the log would 
be made into boards. At first the little bear was 
very careful, for he remembered what his papa 
had told him, but after a while the little bear went 
close to the biggest saw in the whole mill and 
watched it go through the logs. 

“Now, you know that bears always smell of a 
thing when they want to know what it is, so this 
little bear said to himself, ‘Papa didn’t tell me 
not to smell of the saw; he told me not to touch it. 
I think that I will smell of this wonderful thing 
that eats through the logs and makes them into 
boards.’ He went closer and closer. Pie was a 
little afraid even to smell of the saw after all that 
his papa had told him, but he went closer and closer 
to the saw, until finally he reached out as far as 
he could with his nose to smell. Ouch! ouch! ouch!! 
The awfullest howling and squealing that you ever 
heard from a little bear. 

“The Papa Bear ran in as fast as he could, and 
what do you think he saw? The poor little bear’s 
face was all covered with blood, and he was howling 
and screaming as hard as he could. You see, the 
little bear could not see the teeth of the great saw, 


38 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


for they were going around so fast, and he had 
put his nose too close, and the saw had sawed the 
end of his nose right in two. 

“Well, the poor Papa Bear was very, very sorry. 
Pie licked the blood off the little bear’s face, and 
took him over to the house that the man had made 
for them. After a long time the little bear went to 
sleep. But his nose hurt so badly that he awoke in 
the night many times. 

“The next morning the little bear said to his 
papa, ‘Papa, I am sorry that I didn’t obey you; 
you knew best; you always do, and I’ll try not 
to be a bad little bear again.’ The Papa Bear said, 
‘That’s right, my little one, I am sorry that you 
were so badly hurt; I will not scold you, for I 
am sure that you have learned it is really best to 
do what papa tells you to do, and not to do the 
things that your papa tells you not to do.’ The little 
bear said, ‘I have, papa.’ What do you suppose 
they called the little bear after that. They called 
him the ‘Split-Nosed Bear.’ ” 

When the Papa Bear had finished the story, he 
said to the Cub Bear, “What do you think of that 
story?” 

And the little Cub Bear answered, “I think that 
it is best to do what papa says.” 

Then the Papa Bear said, “That is right. Now 
you must run back into the cave and go to sleep.” 

That night the little Cub Bear dreamed a bad 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 39 


dream. I do not know what it was, but he spoke 
aloud in his sleep and said, “I am always going to 
mind my papa,” and then he felt the end of his 
nose with his paw. Can you guess what he was 
dreaming about? 

The next morning the little Cub Bear wakened 
very early and rubbed his eyes and wondered 
whether any of the animals would come from the 
circus. He listened and listened. 

Pretty soon he heard a very faint little patter, 
as if made by very small feet, and the Cub Bear 
listened and listened, and then he went to the door 
and looked out, and he said: 

“I see a very strange animal coming. He has the 
shortest little legs. Pie is smaller than a very 
small dog, about as large as two cats, and he has 
a funny little sharp nose, and he has black and 
white stripes down his back.” 

Just then the owl saw the animal, and he said, 
“Who-o-o? who-o-o?” but the animal didn’t answer 
him. He came right along to the mouth of the 
den. 

Just as he reached there, the Circus Bear said, 
“I know who that is. That is Mr. Badger. Ask 
him to come in.” 

So the little Cub Bear said very politely, “Come 
in, Mr. Badger;” and the badger came in. 

The Cub Bear said, “We are going to try to build 
a house large enough for all the animals, so if 


40 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


they come to see us we will have a place for them to 
stay. Can you help us?” 

And the badger said, “I would be very glad to 
help you if I could, because your brother was very 
good to me when we were in the circus.” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “What can you do?” 

And the badger said, “I can dig a round hole, just 
as big around as I am, and dig very fast.” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “That is nice. 
Perhaps you can make us a chimney. Here is a 
place in the side of the den where there is nothing 
but earth and dirt.” 

He took the badger over and showed him, and the 
badger said, “Yes, I can make you a fine chimney.” 
So he commenced to scratch, and he scratched and 
he scratched very fast, digging up, instead of down; 
and he scratched and scratched, and the first thing 
you know, when the little Cub Bear looked, he 
didn’t see any badger, but he saw the dirt falling 
out of the hole where the badger was; and the 
badger scratched and scratched, and more dirt came 
down. First thing you knew, no more dirt came 
down, but the little Cub Bear went and looked up 
the hole, and he could see clear out to the blue 
sky. Just then they heard a patter at the door, and 
there was Mr. Badger. He had made a hole clear 
out into the open air, a nice chimney, and he came 
in and sat down with the other animals. 

That day the animals all worked as hard as ever, 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 41 


and at night when the Papa Bear sat down to 
rest, the little Cub Bear ran over to him and said, 
“Papa, please tell me another story about the 
‘Little - Split - N osed - Bear - that -would - not- mind-his- 
papa.’ ” 

“All right;” said the Papa Bear, “I will, if you 
will promise me to go to bed as soon as I have 
finished.” 

The little Cub Bear said, “I will, papa.” So the 
Papa Bear told: 


THE STORY OF THE “LITTLE-SPLIT-NOSED- 
BEAR-THAT-WOULD-NOT-MIND- 
HIS-PAPA” 

M OU remember that the little bear that had his 



JL nose split by the great circular saw lived with a 
man who owned a large saw-mill. For a long time 
after the little bear had his nose sawed in two, he 
kept away from the mill. 

“He said to himself, T will never go in that mill 
to be hurt again, and I will mind my papa.’ For 
his papa had told him to keep out of the saw-mill. 

“But one day the little Split-Nosed Bear was 
playing with a dog that belonged to the man who 
owned the saw-mill. They were having a fine time, 
playing bear hunt. The little Split-Nosed Bear 
was playing the bear, and the little dog was playing 
that he was a big bloodhound dog running after 
the bear. The dog was really a very small dog, 
white, with brown ears, and a stub tail. You see 
he lived in a saw-mill, too. The little Split-Nosed 
Bear would growl, g-r-o-w-1, g-r-o-w-1, and the little 
dog would run away as if he was terribly fright¬ 
ened. Then the dog would run after the little 
Split-Nosed-Bear and bark, and he could bark very, 
very loud for so small a dog. Bow! wow! wow! 
Bow! wow! wow! Then the little Split-Nosed-Bear 


42 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 43 


would run away just as if he was terribly fright¬ 
ened. Then the little Split-Nosed-Bear would hide, 
and it would take the dog a long time to find him. 

“They were having a splendid time jumping 
around and running in and out of the dark places, 
when the little Split-Nosed-Bear ran into the saw¬ 
mill, for he was playing so hard that he forgot all 

about the saw and what his papa had told him. The 

* _ 

little dog was so close to the little Split-Nosed-Bear 
that the little bear ran as fast as he could, and 
jumped up on to an iron platform that looked just 
as if it were made on purpose for a little bear to 
jump up on, and there the little Split-Nosed-Bear 
stood looking down at the dog and g-r-o-w-l-i-n-g, 
g-r-o-w-l-i-n-g, at him. The little dog jumped up 
as far as he could and bit the Split-Nosed-Bear 
on his heel. Then the little Split-Nosed-Bear 
whirled around like a flash, and what do you sup¬ 
pose happened? 

“Ouch! Ouch! Ouch! 

“And such growling and howling and squealing 
you never heard. The little dog ran away as fast 
as he could, for he was really frightened this time. 
‘K-i-yi! K-i-yi! K-i-yi F he howled, as he ran out 
of the door. 

“The Papa Bear heard the noise. He was afraid 
that the Split-Nosed-Bear was really killed this 
time, so he ran as fast as he could to the little 
bear, and—what do you suppose he saw? There was 


44 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


the little Split-Nosed-Bear rolling about on the floor, 
and up on the iron platform where he had been 
playing was a little brown bear’s ear. Oh! how 
sorry the Papa Bear felt to think his poor little 
bear had lost his ear, just because he had forgotten 
to do as his papa had told him to do. You see 
the little Split-Nosed-Bear had been standing on the 
iron platform of a band saw. What he thought 
was a strap whirling around two wheels was really 
a saw. When the Split-Nosed-Bear had turned 
around quickly, his ear had come against the saw, 
and it was sawed off quicker than you could think, 
with a zip-p-p and a buz-z-z. 

“The Papa Bear licked the stump of the ear and 
said, T am so sorry, dear little Split-Nosed-Bear, 
that you forgot and did not mind your papa.’ 

“As soon as he could talk the little Split-Nosed- 
Bear said, Til always mind my papa after this/ 
“The Papa Bear put him to bed, but his ear hurt 
so that he wakened several times in the night. 
After the little Split-Nosed-Bear got well they 
always called him the little ‘One-Eared-Bear-that- 
would-not-mind-his-papa/ 

“This is the end of my story about the little 
Split-Nosed-Bear,” said the Papa Bear, as he fin¬ 
ished. “Now, little Cub Bear, run to bed in the back 
of the cave, and go to sleep as quickly as you can.” 

The little Cub Bear ran quickly to bed, and went 
to sleep in the dark alone, for he wanted to be a 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 45 


brave little bear. But after he had been sleeping a 
while, he talked in his sleep and said, “I am always 
going to mind my papa.” Then he felt of his ear 
and m-o-a-n-e-d. Can you guess what the little 
Cub Bear was dreaming about? 

The next morning the little Cub Bear wakened 
very early, and as soon as he had rubbed his eyes, he 
wondered if any of the animals would come that day. 
He listened, the Circus Bear listened, and Susie Bear 
listened. Pretty soon they heard something coming 
up the path, and little Cub Bear rushed to the mouth 
of the den to see what it was, and he said: 

“I see a very strange animal coming up the path. 
It has the most beautiful fur I ever saw, ever so 
much finer than bear’s fur, and the animal looks 
something like Mr. Badger, only its fur is all one 
color, and it has the funniest tail, almost as big 
as a shovel, flat and broad.” 

Just then the owl saw the animal and said, 
“Who-o-o? who-o-o?” 

But the animal didn’t answer at all, except he 
gave two slaps with his broad flat tail on the ground. 

And the Circus Bear said, “I know who that is. 
That is Mr. Beaver. Ask him to come in.” 

Mr. Beaver came to the door, and the little Cub 
Bear said very politely, “Come in, Mr. Beaver.” 

The beaver came in, and the little Cub Bear 
said, “We are going to try to build a house big 
enough for all the animals, so if they come to see 


46 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


us we will have a place for them to stay. Can 
you help us?” 

And the beaver said, “I will be very glad to, 
because your brother was very good to me when 
we were in the circus.” 

The little Cub Bear said, “What can you do?” 

And the beaver said, “I can build dams across 
streams so as to make beautiful lakes, such as they 
have in parks, and I can build a nice, round house 
in the lake to live in and large enough for a little 
bear to live in, if he can only get inside without 
getting wet.” 

And the Cub Bear said, “That would be fine, 
because we could have a park for the animals 
to play in, and some of the animals would rather 
live in the water, anyway, than live in a cave.” 

So the beaver said, “All right; I will make you 
a dam and a beautiful lake.” 

So they all went down to the stream, and the 
beaver went up to a tree, and he commenced to 
bite it. He bit, and he bit, and he bit, and the chips 
just flew, and he bit, and he bit, and he bit, and 
the chips just flew, and the first thing they knew, 
the tree fell over. Then he went to another tree, not 
a very large tree, only about so thick (three inches). 
Then he went to another tree, and he bit, and he bit, 
and bit, and the first thing they knew, that tree 
fell over. So he kept on until he had cut down a 
great many trees, and then he took them down 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 47 


and put them in the stream, and he put in leaves; 
and then the water began to rise higher and higher, 
and the beaver kept piling in and piling in leaves 
and trees, and soon he had a high dam clear across 
the stream. The next morning when they looked, 
the water had filled up above the dam and made a 
beautiful lake. Soon the beaver went to work, and 
made a house out of mud. He used his fore feet 
like hands, walking on his hind feet, and he used 
his flat tail to make a beautiful mud house, big 
enough to live in himself, and big enough for little 
Cub Bear to get in, if he could only get in without 
getting wet. Could you make so nice a mud house? 

And the little Cub Bear said, “Thank you, Mr. 
Beaver,” very politely. “I am very glad my brother 
was good to Mr. Beaver in the circus.” 

As soon as they had seen the dam built by the 
beaver, all of the animals began to work again 
as hard as they could work to make the cave larger, 
because it was much too small for the animals that 
were already there, and the elephant could not get 
in at all. 

At night they were all very tired, but as soon as 
the Papa Bear sat down, the little Cub Bear ran 
over and got as close as he could to his papa and 
asked him to tell another story about the “Little- 
One-Eared-Bear4hat-wouldmotmiind-his-papa.” So 
although he was very tired, the Papa Bear began 
the story of: 


THE “ONE-EARED-BEAR-THAT-WOULD-NOT 

MIND-HIS-PAPA” 

OU remember that the little bear had promised 

JL that he would not go into the saw-mill at all; 
but one day the little One-Eared-Bear was very lone¬ 
some. He wanted to go into the mill, but he remem¬ 
bered that his papa had told him again, that very 
morning, that he must be sure to keep away from 
the saw-mill. He thought a while, and then he said 
to himself, Tapa didn’t tell me to keep out of the 
planing-mill. I think that I will go in there.’ 

“Now the planing-mill was just as bad a place for 
little bears as the saw-mill itself, and the little 
One-Eared-Bear knew this, but you see he ivanted 
to go in, and so he went in any way. What do 
you suppose happened to the One-Eared-Bear this 
time? 

“He played for a while, and had a very fine time. 
He enjoyed it so much that he said he would come 
again; he liked to see the wheels go round and 
round with a whiz-z-z-z-z-z and whir-r-r-r. Just 
then the little One-Eared-Bear saw a funny machine 
with a thing buzzing around that looked like a 
roller such as a cook uses to roll out cookies with. 

“The little bear said, T want to feel the wind that 
must be made by this roller going so fast, but I’ll 

48 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 49 


not get close enough to touch the thing, for I 
might get hurt, and I don’t want to get hurt again.’ 

“So the little One-Eared-Bear reached out his 
paw very carefully, closer and closer. Ouch! Ouch! 
Ouch! Such howling and squealing you never 
heard. What do you think had happened? The 
little One-Eared-Bear had touched the sharp knives 
or planes that whirl round and round in a planer. 
You see they go around so fast that you can not see 
them at all, for they look just like a solid roller. 
Well, the poor little One-Eared-Bear’s foot was 
bleeding and looked terrible. 

“The Papa Bear heard the little One-Eared- 
Bear’s howling, and ran in to the mill as fast as he 
could, and there he saw that the little one had lost 
all the toes of one foot. The Papa Bear licked the 
little one’s foot, and did everything that he could 
to make his little bear feel better, but he could not 
put back those poor little toes. The little One- 
Eared-Bear was very, very sorry, too. Once he 
whimpered, and told his papa that he was ever 
so sorry that he had not done as his papa had told 
him to do, and said that he would never, never again 
do anything that his papa told him not to do. But 
that didn’t make his toes grow again. 

“The little One-Eared-Bear went to bed that night, 
but he didn’t sleep very well, because his foot hurt 
him so much. After a long while the foot 
healed, so that the little bear could walk around, 


50 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


but he always limped as long as he lived. He 
said that he could never again forget to do as his 
papa told him to do, because every step that he 
took he remembered that foot, and how he had lost 
all his toes by not doing as his papa told him. After 
that they didn’t call the little bear the little One- 
Eared-Bear any more. They always called him— 
what do you suppose? The Club-foot Bear.” 

When the little Cub Bear’s papa had finished tell¬ 
ing the story of the little One-Eared-Bear, the little 
Cub Bear said, “I think that it is best to do what 
papa says.” 

And the Papa Bear said, “That’s right, dear 
little cub. Now run back into the cave and go to 
sleep.” 

The little Cub Bear ran quickly to the back part 
of the cave, where it was all dark, and went to bed 
on some roots and brush and was soon asleep. 
When he was fast asleep, he talked in his sleep 
and said, “I am always going to do what my papa 
tells me to do.” And then he felt of one of his 
paws and moaned, m-o-a-n-e-d, a sad little moan. 
Can you guess what the little Cub Bear was dream¬ 
ing about? 

The next morning the beaver and the owl and 
the monkey were talking together, and the beaver 
said: 

“I am going down to live in that beautiful mud 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 51 


house that I made yesterday in the lake. The house 
has several rooms inside, and the door is under the 
water. I can swim out there, and then dive under 
the water and come up inside the house. No one 
could find me in there. When I am swimming 
around in the lake, or working on the dam, if I 
see any one coming, I will jump into the water and 
hit the water two great slaps with my tail.” 

And the monkey said, “Yes, I know how that 
sounds. That sounds just like a gun.” 

The owl said as soon as he saw any one coming 
he would say, “Who-o-o? who-o-o?” 

And the monkey said that he thought he would 
go out every morning and see if he couldn’t find 
some of the animals and bring them up to the cave, 
and see if they would like to live there in the cave, 
if it could be made big enough for them. 

So the beaver went down to the dam to work, and 
the monkey went out to see if he could find any of 
the animals, and the old owl flew up into the tree, 
and sat out on the end of a dead limb and waited. 

Before very long the little Cub Bear heard, “Bang! 
Bang!” He knew the beaver had seen some animal 
coming, and had struck the water with his tail, so he 
ran to the mouth of the cave to see what it was. Soon 
he heard a rustling noise and looked down the path. 

“I see a large animal coming,” he said. “He 
looks very fierce. He is as large as a large bear, 
but he is yellow all over, and has long, shaggy hair 


52 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


all over his head, and beautiful, large eyes, and a 
long tail, with a tassel on the end of it.” 

Just then the owl saw this animal and said, 
“Who-o-o? who-o-o?” 

The animal opened his mouth and gave the most 
awful, “Roar!! Roar!! Roar!!! Roar!!!!” you ever 
heard. It frightened the little Cub Bear so that 
he didn’t stop to hear what the Circus Bear said, 
or find out what kind of an animal it was at all, 
but he ran clear back in the very back of the cave, 
into Jenny’s room, and there he waited, almost 
frightened to death. 

As soon as the little Cub Bear got over his fright, 
he noticed the air blowing through a crack. It 
seemed to come right out of the mountain. He did 
not understand, and thought he would ask his 
brother about it. Just then the Circus Bear said, 
“Come out, come out, little Cub Bear; don’t be 
afraid; the animal is a lion, and he won’t hurt you, 
because he is a tame lion, and is a very good friend 
of mine.” 

So the little Cub Bear came out and went to the 
mouth of the cave, just in time to meet the lion 
and the monkey, and he said very politely, “Come 
in, Mr. Lion.” And the lion came in, and the little 
Cub Bear said, “We are going to try to build a house 
big enough for all the animals, so if they come to see 
us, we will have a place for them to stay. Can you 
help us?” 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 53 


And the lion said, “I would be very glad to help 
you if I could, because your brother was very good 
to me when we were in the circus.” 

And little Cub Bear said, “What can you do?” 

And the lion said, “I don’t know. I never built 
a house, because I always lived in the jungle, where 
there are lots of trees and grass, and we found our 
houses already built, just like your den. But I will 
do anything you want me to. I can jump ever so 
far.” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “That is nice. Let’s 
see how far you can jump.” 

Then the Papa Bear and the Mamma Bear, and 
the little Cub Bear, and the monkey all went out 
to see how far the lion could jump. The owl flapped 
his great wings and said, “To-whit! To-whit! 
To-whit!” 

The lion crept away, then he said: 

“Now, I will show you how I catch things to eat.” 

And he pointed to a log of wood ten or fifteen 
feet away, and he said, “I will show you what I 
would do if that log were a deer.” 

The lion crouched and lay as still as a little mouse, 
and the bears were all still, waiting to see what the 
lion would do. There was not a sound in the forest. 
Suddenly, little Cub Bear saw a yellow flash through 
the air and heard a thud. Then he looked at the 
log of wood, and there was the lion on the log with 
his claws stuck into it. 


54 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


And the little Cub Bear said, “My! I am glad 
I am not a deer, and that the lion does not want 
me for his dinner.” 

The animals worked all morning, trying to make 
the cave larger, but the Papa Bear went off with 
little Susie Bear to see what they could find to eat. 
When dinner time came, the animals all rested for 
a while. 

As they were sitting there talking, little Cub 
Bear said to the lion, “Mr. Lion, I wish you would 
tell me a story about the most narrow escape you 
ever had in your life.” 


THE LION’S STORY OF HIS MOST NARROW 

ESCAPE 


“WELL” said the lion, “you know I used to live 

W in Africa, and used to eat deer and other ani¬ 
mals. You remember I showed you this morning 
how I would catch deer? 

“Well, one night it was very dark, and I climbed 
up on a bank, and there I waited. I could not hear 
a sound. Everything was just as still as could be. 
Suddenly, a long way off, I heard a sound as if an 
animal was moving. Below the bank there was 
a path that the animals took when they went to 
get water, and it seemed to me that this animal 
was coming along the path, and would soon be 
right under the place where I was waiting. I 
watched and watched, and the animal came nearer 
and nearer and nearer; but it was very dark, and 
I couldn’t see a thing, and I was very sure, any 
way, that it was a deer, and that I could have him 
for my supper. The animal came nearer and 
nearer, and, finally, I gave a great leap; and what 
do you suppose I landed upon? The back of a 
rhinoceros. 

“You know a rhinoceros has a skin almost as 
hard as iron, and right on the end of his nose two 
horns, very sharp. If I had landed on those horns, 

55 


56 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


it surely would have killed me. The rhinoceros 
was terribly frightened, and so was I. He snorted 
and roared almost like a locomotive. I tried to 
dig my claws into his back, but I couldn’t get 
through his tough hide at all. It was just like 
trying to scratch a locomotive. He jumped and 
rolled over and hurt my foot, and I found I couldn’t 
move, because he had one of his great feet on my 
claws.” 

Then the lion pointed to his claw and showed 
how it was all bent and twisted and scarred, and 
said, “That is where the rhinoceros stepped on my 
foot. 

“Finally the rhinoceros grew so angry that he 
put his tongue out. I reached up and bit a hole 
clear through his tongue, and then he ran away 
as fast as he could, and I ran away as fast as I 
could, but I had to run on three feet. And that 
is the end of my story.” 

The little Cub Bear looked at the lion, then he 
looked at the lion’s lame foot, and then he scratched 
his head and said, “I think it is a good plan to 
Took before you leap.’ ” 

And the lion said, “I wish somebody had told 
me that a long time ago.” 

After the lion had finished his story, and the 
animals had eaten their dinner, they commenced 
to work again, and worked all afternoon. Late that 
night the Papa Bear came home with a lot of 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 57 


strawberries that he had found, and all of the bears 
had a fine supper. The elephant ate hay and grass 
and the other animals found something they liked 
to eat. 

After the lion had finished the story, the little 
Cub Bear commenced to tease his papa for a story 
about the “Little-Club-Foot-Bear-that-would-not- 
mind-his-papa,” but the Papa Bear said that he 
was tired of telling stories about the u Little-bear- 
that-would-not-mind-his-papa,” but would tell a 
story about a club-foot grizzly bear, if the little 
Cub Bear wanted to hear it. The little Cub Bear 
said that he did, and snuggled up as close as he 
could to his papa, for grizzly bears are as large as 
four or five grown-up brown bears all put together, 
and they have great teeth and claws. They like 
to eat little pigs, and little calves, and such things 
instead of berries and honey. When the little Cub 
Bear had snuggled up as close to his papa as he 
could the Papa Bear commenced. 


THE TRUE STORY OF HOW TEN MEN DID 

NOT KILL CLUB-FOOT 


ttTJTHEN I was a little cub bear, long before I met 

W your mother, and long before you were born, 
I lived in a small cave near a store, where men used 
to meet and talk about the bears that they had 
killed, and mountain lions that they had seen, and 
all sorts of stories of that kind. Well, I used to 
come down in the dark sometimes, and put my ear 
up to the crack between the logs, and listen to what 
the men said. 

“One evening, while the men were telling stories, 
one of them said, ‘Did you ever hear of the big 
grizzly, called Club-Foot?’ 

“And all the men said that they had heard of 
Club-Foot, except one of the men that had not 
lived there very long. He said that he had never 
heard of this grizzly. The men told this new¬ 
comer that Club-Foot was a very large bear, one 
of the largest that had ever been seen. The men said 
that a great many men had tried to kill this giant 
grizzly, because he would kill their little pigs and 
their little calves and colts. Then, too, they wanted 
to get his great skin to make a carriage robe. But 
they had never been able to get the bear. For 
even if they hit him with bullets from their guns, 

58 



HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 59 


it did not seem to hurt him much, but made him 
very angry. This grizzly, instead of running away 
from a man with a gun, would run right up to 
him and knock the gun out of his hand. No one 
could kill this bear. 

“They said that the bear lived in the San Ber¬ 
nardino Mountains, and that his great tracks had 
often been seen, and that all of his toes were miss¬ 
ing from one foot. That was the reason they called 
him ‘Club-Foot.’ Probably when he was a little 
bear he had been caught in a trap and lost his toes. 
They said that the bear made regular trips from 
Mount San Bernardino to the Antelope Valley, sixty 
miles away. He had made the trips so often, that 
he had made a sort of trail through the mountains. 
This trail, the men said, was only a mile or so back 
of the store. 

“While the men were talking, another man came 
in and said, ‘Old Club-Foot has started from his 
den, in the side of Mount San Bernardino, and is 
coming this way. He ought to be along here some 
time to-night.’ 

“Then one of the men that they called ‘Alex’ said, 
‘It is a fine moonlight night to-night. Let’s all get 
our guns and go up to the old grizzly’s trail, and 
see if we can’t kill him. There is a pig-pen right 
near the trail, with little pigs in it, so that the 
grizzly will be sure to stop there long enough for 
us to shoot him.’ 


60 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


“Then the man that came in last and told about 
the Club-Foot’s coming, said, There are two Irish¬ 
men that live a little farther on along the trail that 
are going to do the same thing. They are going to 
watch near another pig-pen that is farther on, and 
they think that they will kill Club-Foot/ 

“ ‘Well,’ Alex said, ‘there will be ten of us with 
guns of all sorts, and I think that those Irishmen 
will never see old Club-Foot, for he will never get 
as far as they are. We will have his skin by that 
time.’ 

“All the men said, ‘We’ll do it. It will be lots 
of fun, and Club-Foot will not bother the farmer’s 
little pigs and calves, and colts any more/ 

“All the men got their guns and rifles, and some 
lunch to eat while they were waiting for old Club- 
Foot to come along. I was very curious to see what 
the men would do and how they would kill the 
grizzly, and then, too, I wanted to see a great 
grizzly bear; so I followed the men, but I kept so 
far behind that they did not see me at all. As 
the men walked along they talked about how they 
would kill old Club-Foot, as they called the great 
grizzly bear. The men said they thought they 
would climb trees, and wait in the tops of them, 
where they would be safer, and where the bear 
could not get at them before they had had a chance to 
kill him. Two men, though, said that they were go¬ 
ing to stay on the ground, and that the other men 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 61 


ought not to be afraid and climb in the tops of the 
trees; they ought to stay down on the ground and 
shoot the bear there, and they laughed at the men 
who said they were going to stay up in the trees. 

“Finally they came to the path that old Club- 
Foot usually traveled, and there was the pig-pen 
with the little pigs in it. All the men but two 
climbed up into the trees, and there they waited. 
I went around and hid behind a rock, to see what 
would happen. 

“Very soon there came a great crashing noise, 
and as I looked up along the path I saw old Club- 
Foot coming very fast. He didn’t stop for any¬ 
thing. He went right through the bushes, and 
jumped over the tops of the small trees, and as he 
came out into the moonlight he seemed to be as big 
as Jumbo. I waited and thought I would hear 
the men shooting; but suddenly I heard the men 
who were on the ground crying out to the men who 
had gone up in the trees, ‘Don’t shoot; don’t shoot. 
If you shoot the old Club-Foot and don’t kill him, 
he will surely kill us.’ 

“And they dropped their guns and ran as fast 
as they could and commenced to climb trees. They 
climbed up a little way, but they were so frightened, 
and so hurried, that they would slip back. 

“Old Club-Foot came right along, but he didn’t 
notice the men at all, or pay any attention to them. 
He went right up to the pig-pen, and he hit it one 


62 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


blow and knocked it all to pieces. He took up two 
pigs, one in each of his two great forepaws, and 
off he went down the path, and not one of the men 
fired a single shot. 

“Pretty soon the men came down from the trees, 
and then they all began to scold one another. One 
man said to Alex, ‘Why didn’t you shoot?’ 

“ ‘Well,’ he said, ‘the old Club-Foot looked as big 
as an elephant, and I thought if I shot him and 
didn’t kill him, that he would come and skake the 
tree down and eat me up.’ 

“And the other men said that was the reason 
that they didn’t shoot. Then they said to the brave 
fellows who stayed on the ground, ‘Why didn’t you 
shoot?’ 

“ ‘Well,’ they said, ‘we didn’t know the bear was 
so big.’ 

“After the men had got nearly home, they sat 
down and talked it all over, and one of them said, 
‘What will you say to the two Irishmen that were 
going to kill Club-Foot? You know we thought 
we would kill him, and he would never get as far 
as the Irishmen?’ 

“And they all agreed that they would not say a 
thing about it to any one, but would wait and see 
what the Irishmen said when they came into the 
store the next evening. 

“Well, the next evening, I went down and hid 
behind the house to hear what the men would say. 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 63 


And sure enough, very soon in came the two Irish¬ 
men. One Irishmen was named Mike, and the 
other, Pat. The men all said, ‘Hello, Mike/ and 
‘Hello, Pat.’ But no one said anything about old 
Club-Foot. 

“After a while Alex said, ‘Well, Mike, where is 
the bear skin you were going to bring us?* For 
Mike had said that he would have a bear skin for 
them that night. ‘Didn't you see old Club-Foot?' 

“ ‘Yes,' Mike said, ‘we saw Club-Foot. He came 
right by us, and we were sitting on the roof of 
the pig-pen. He knocked the pig-pen right out from 
under us, and took a little pig and ran off with it.' 

“ ‘Well/ Alex said, ‘why didn't you shoot him?' 

“And Mike said, ‘Well—well, we couldn't find 
our guns.' 

“And so that was the way that the ten men 
didn't kill old Club-Foot. And it is said that he 
is still living in the San Bernardino Mountains, and 
still goes over the same old trail every year. For 
some reason, no one has ever succeeded in getting 
him." 

After Papa Bear had finished the story, little 
Cub Bear said, “I wish I were a great big grizzly 
bear, so that I would not be afraid of a gun." 
But the Papa Bear said, “It is always a good thing 
to be afraid of a gun, no matter how big you may 
be." 

The little Cub Bear ran off to bed in the dark, 


64 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


and was soon fast asleep. In his sleep he reached 
out with his paw and gave a great slap, then a 
moment after he reached out again and gave another 
slap. Can you guess what he was dreaming about? 

The next morning the little Cub Bear woke up very 
early, and rubbed his eyes, and wondered if any 
animal would come that day. He listened and 
listened, but he heard nothing. 

Suddenly there was a loud “Bang! Bang!” and 
he knew that some animal was coming. The little 
Cub Bear ran to the mouth of the den, where he 
could hear a rustling sound. He looked down the 
path, but could see nothing. He looked again and 
this time he looked up among the branches of the 
trees, because he thought it might be a bird coming. 
And what do you think he saw? Away up among 
the branches of the trees he could see an animal's 
head. He said: 

“I see an animal's head moving among the trees. 
His head has large ears and very large eyes, and 
two horns different from any horns I ever saw. 
They are blunt on the end, and stick straight up, 
and seem to have hair on the end of the horns. I 
can't see the animal, but I see a long, long neck, 
covered with big yellow spots. As the animal comes 
nearer, I can see more of his neck. And now I 
can see his legs and his body. His body looks 
something like a horse, only the hind legs are much 
shorter than the front legs. If you tried to ride 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 65 


on his back you would slip off behind, because it 
is slanting, like a hill, and all covered with those 
yellow spots/’ 

Just then the owl saw this animal, and he said, 
“Who-o-o-o? who-o-o-o?” 

The animal did not answer a word, but came 
right along. Just as he got to the mouth of the 
den, the Circus Bear said, “I know who that is. 
That is Mr. Giraffe. Ask him to come in.” 

So the little Cub Bear said very politely, “Come 
in, Mr. Giraffe.” 

But, of course, the giraffe could not come in. 

Finally, he knelt down and stuck his long neck 
into the cave, and the Cub Bear said to him, “We 
are going to try to build a house big enough for all 
the animals, so if they come to see us we will have 
a place for them to stay. Can you help us?” 

And the giraffe said, “I would be very glad to 
help you if I could, because your brother was very 
good to me when we were in the circus.” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “What can you 
do?” 

And the giraffe answered, “I don’t know. I never 
built a house in my life. I eat the leaves off the trees 
and live out-of-doors, just like horses and zebras and 
cows. I never had a home. But, I have the longest 
neck of any animal in the whole world, and if there 
is anything up in the air you want me to look for, or 
if there is anything a long way off that you would 


66 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


like to have me see, I think I can look for it for 
you.” 

And the little Cub Bear suddenly thought of the 
hole way back in the back part of the cave where 
the wind came from, and he said, “I wish you 
would come in and see if you can put your head 
through a hole in the back part of the cave. Maybe 
you will find something.” 

And the giraffe said, “I will be very glad to try.” 

And so he wriggled, and twisted, and got into the 
den, and got away back in the back part, and he 
found a hole, and it was just large enough for his 
head and his long neck. He stuck his head farther 
and farther into the hole, and stayed there so long 
that the little Cub Bear was afraid something was 
wrong, so, he and the monkey took hold of the 
giraffe’s tail and pulled just as hard as they could. 

The giraffe finally pulled his head out of the 
hole, and the Cub Bear said, “What did you see?” 

And the giraffe said, “I found it very dark, and 
I had to keep my head in a long time so that my 
eyes would get used to the darkness, but I could see 
that there was a large room—a large cave back of 
this cave. I couldn’t see the end of it at all. I 
think if we could only get into this room, we would 
have a place large enough for all the animals in 
the circus, if they wanted to come here to live.” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “My! Wouldn’t 
that be nice? I wonder, if all the animals would 



“Come in, Mr. Giraffe.” 

















HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 67 


help, if we couldn’t break down the rock and get 
into this room?” 

That night, after all the animals had done all 
they could to get things to eat and to make the cave 
large enough, the lion and some of the other animals 
came into the cave. The giraffe was still out 
trying to get enough leaves to eat, and the elephant 
was eating the last of the baled hay that had been 
brought from the train wreck. 

“Papa, please tell me another story about the 
‘Little-Club-Foot-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his- 
papa\” The Papa Bear siged a great sigh, because 
he was very tired, but he wanted to please the little 
fellow so he told the story of: 


THE “CLUB-FOOT-BEAR-THAT-WOULD-NOT- 
MIND-HIS-PAPA”—A GREAT SMASH-UP 


U FTER the ‘Little-Club-Foot-Bear-that-would- 



jlIL not-mind-his-papa’ had had his nose split, 
had lost an ear, had nearly drowned three times, 
and all of the toes had been cut off of one foot, 
the Papa Bear thought he had better move away to 
some place where there were not so many things to 
hurt little bears. So he moved a long, long way to 
a place where there was a great coal mine. 

“There the men would go down in the ground 
and dig coal from away under the ground. The 
coal was to be burned in stoves to keep little boys 
and girls warm in the winter time, for they do not 
sleep all winter as little bears do. The coal was 
used also to cook what the little boys and girls 
and their papas and their mammas ate—bread, and 
meat, and pies, and cakes, and everything nice. 
The coal was used to make the railway monsters go 
back and forth on the tracks, hauling men, and 
circus trains, and freight trains. A railway mon¬ 
ster could not go, ‘T-o-o-t, t-o-o-t P or ‘C-h-u, c-h-u, 
c—h—uP move, or do anything without coal or 
coal-oil. 

“The ‘Little-Club-Foot-Bear-that-would-not-mind- 
his-papa’ thought that the coal mine was very fine. 


68 



HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 69 


He liked to watch the men as they went down into 
the ground in the cages or elevators, and to watch 
them come up at night with their little coffee-pot- 
like lamps, hanging in the front of their caps to 
show them where to go in the dark. (You see 
that it was always dark way down in the mine.) 

“He liked to watch the engine as it went, Tuff, 
puff, puff!’ but this engine did not move back and 
forth, like a locomotive. It was called a stationary 
engine, because it stood in one place, and how do 
you suppose it moved the men? One part of the 
engine was called a drum, because it was round 
like a drum, and on this was a great steel rope, 
like a thread on a great spool. As the drum or spool 
turned around and round, the rope would be wound 
up or unwound, and the rope went up over a great 
wheel and then hung down in the hole and the 
cage with the men in it was on the end of the rope, 
and as the rope unwound, the cage went down into 
the hole in the ground, and as it wound up the cage 
came up to the top of the ground. But the man 
had to be very careful to stop in time, or the men 
and cage and all would be wound around the drum 
and smashed and killed. 

“Now the Papa Bear was very careful to tell 
the little bear never, never to touch the engine, or 
anything about it; but one day the Tittle Club- 
Foot-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his-papa’ went into 
the engine room, when every one else had gone away 


70 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


to dinner. The engineer had just stepped out. It 
was a cold day, and the little bear enjoyed the warm 
room. The machinery was all so bright, some 
looked like gold, and some looked like silver, and 
some parts were a beautiful bright red, and others 
were a pretty green. After the ‘Little-Club-Foot- 
Bear-that-would-not-mind-his-papa’ had been there 
a while, he saw a sort of handle, and before he 
stopped to think, he reached up and gave it a strong 
pull, to see if it would move. And what do you 
think happened? 

“The engine went Tuff, puff, puff V The wheels 
went around and around, and the drums com¬ 
menced to wind the rope up very, very fast. My! 
how frightened the little Club-Foot-Bear was. He 
ran away as fast as he could run, but he was 
scarcely out of the door before the cage came to the 
top of the ground. But there was no one to stop 
the engine, and so the cage went on up to the wheel, 
and there was a great crash, and down came the 
wheel and cage. And on and on to the great drum, 
and then there was the greatest tearing, and smash¬ 
ing, and breaking you ever heard—Tang! Bang! 
Smash! Smash! Crack! Crack! Crash! Crash!’ and 
then the noise stopped, for the beautiful engine 
was broken all to pieces, and the Tittle-Club-Foot- 
Bear-that-would-not-mind-his-papa’ ran and ran, 
and he didn’t go home that night, nor the next night, 
for he was ashamed to meet his papa. 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 71 


“And all the time he was saying, ‘Oh, why didn’t 
I mind my papa? The beautiful engine is all 
smashed, and the poor little donkeys that haul the 
coal cars way down in the mine will starve to death 
because no one can take them anything to eat.’ But 
finally the ‘Little-Club-Foot-Bear-that-would-not- 
mind-his-papa’ went home. He found his papa 
feeling very sad, because he thought his little cub 
was killed. The papa kissed him, and gave him a 
great bear hug, but he felt very sorry, and so did 
the little cub.” 

When the Papa Bear had finished telling the 
story to his little cub, the little bear said very 
sweetly, “Good night, papa dear; I am always 
going to do just what you tell me to do.” And the 
Papa Bear said, “I hope so, little cub.” 

That night the little Cub Bear got up in his sleep 
and ran as fast as he could, but he soon ran against 
his papa, who was sleeping there in the cave. The 
Papa Bear saw that he had been running in his 
sleep, so he took him and put him back in his bed. 
He must have been dreaming. Can you guess what 
he was dreaming about? 

The next morning, after the animals had their 
breakfast, the little Cub Bear told them that the 
giraffe had said that there was a fine cave back of 
the one where the bears lived. So the animals all 
agreed that they would do the best they could, and 


72 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


all work together, to see if they could not succeed 
in making a hole large enough for all the animals 
to get through into the next cave, for you remember 
that the hole was only large enough for the long¬ 
necked giraffe to get his head through. 

They went to work to make the hole larger. The 
mule kicked down rocks; the goat butted down more 
rocks; the monkey, the bears, the Mamma Bear, 
the Papa Bear, Susie Bear, the Circus Bear, and the 
little Cub Bear all carried the rocks out of the cave. 
The elephant helped as well as he could with his 
trunk, but the mouth of the cave was so small that he 
could not get in to work. They all worked until they 
were tired, but they could not get through into the 
cave although the hole was made much larger. 

That night, before they went to sleep, the little 
Cub Bear teased his papa for a story about the 
“Little-Chib-Foot-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his- 
papa,” but the Papa Bear was so tired, that he 
asked if some of the animals would not be willing 
to tell the little Cub Bear a story. The parrot said 
that she had heard the story told by the lion about 
his most narrow escape, and that she would be 
willing to tell the story of her most narrow escape, 
if little Cub Bear would promise not to ask his 
papa for another story that night. Of course, the 
little Cub Bear promised, and so the parrot told 
the story of her most narrow escape from death. 


THE PARROT’S MOST NARROW ESCAPE 


U W ELL/’ said the parrot, “I lived in South 

W America, where there were many beauti¬ 
ful trees and many strange animals, and some of the 
largest snakes in the whole world. The very largest 
snake that lives there is called the boa constrictor. 
He is so large that he can swallow a deer whole, 
and, of course, a poor little parrot, or a chicken, or 
a rabbit, would not make a meal for him. It would 
hardly make a dessert. 

“One day I was seated on the end of a long limb, 
nearly asleep, when suddenly I looked up and saw 
a man pointing a gun at me, and all ready to shoot 
me. I was so frightened that I could not move, 
and I expected him to shoot any minute, but I 
thought that before I was killed, I would take one 
last look at the blue sky that I was never to see again 
—and what do you think I saw? A great snake, 
a boa constrictor, coiled around the limb above me, 
and looking at me as though he wanted to eat me. 
I was more frightened than ever. It seemed that 
his look made me weak, sick and dizzy. Before I 
could move, the snake darted at me like a flash, 
seized me and began to swallow me. In a moment 
I was just like poor Jonah, only I was inside a 
snake instead of a whale. Everything was dark 

73 


74 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


and I could not think, except that I knew I would 
die in a minute. 

“Suddenly I heard a great ‘Bang! Bang!’ and 
the old snake began to squirm and twist. Then in 
a moment I felt something cut through the snake, 
and I was out in the bright sunshine, and the sun 
almost blinded my eyes. You see, the man had 
shot the snake instead of shooting me, as he had 
intended. He took me out and put me in a bag 
that he had with him. 

“Then he sent me to the circus, and I was there 
until the wreck of the train. There I learned to 
talk like the men. I could say, ‘Polly wants a 
cracker/ ‘Come right in, ladies and gentlemen/ and 
many other things. I learned to sneeze like a man, 
‘Ker-chou-ou-ou, ker-chou-ou-ou/ and to snore like 
a man, ‘Aw-hu, aw-h—u, a—w-h—u/ and to 
cough, ‘H-u-h, h-u-h/ and to whistle so that I 

could call a dog, ‘-/ and to cluck 

so that I could make the horses go, and I learned 
to ride on a dog’s back without sticking my claws in 
so that it hurt him. But that is all my story.” 

“My,” said the little Cub Bear, “what a narrow 
escape. We should never lose hope. I’m glad that 
you escaped.” 

After the parrot had finished the story, the little 
Cub Bear went to sleep. When he was sound asleep 
he suddenly began to breathe hard, as though he 
could not get enough air, and he twisted around 




HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 75 


and seemed to be smothering. Soon, though, he 
breathed a great, deep breath, and then he was 
still and quiet. I think that he must have been 
dreaming? Can you guess what he was dreaming 
about? 

The little Cub Bear slept very late next morning, 
and when he got up all of the animals were up, and 
were talking about the cave and wondering whether 
any more of the animals would come that day. 

While the animals were talking they heard two 
great noises, “Bang! bang!” and they knew that 
the beaver was telling them that some animal was 
coming. 

The Cub Bear rushed to the mouth of the cave 
to see who it was, and he said: 

“I see two rats coming up the path. They are 
perfectly white. With the two rats is a rat that is 
bigger than both of them. It has beautiful fur.” 

Just then the Cub Bear looked up at the owl, to 
see why the owl did not say “Who-o-o? who-o-o-o?” 
and just as he looked, he saw the old owl start 
from his perch, with a great fluttering of wings, 
and pounce like a flash down on the rats, and he 
caught one of the white rats in his claws and flew 
back to his perch, and there he began to eat this 
poor little white rat. But the other white rat and 
the muskrat came into the cave. 

The little Cub Bear said very politely, “Come 
in, Mr. Rat.” 


76 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


But the little white rat was trembling so that 
he couldn’t say a thing. 

And the Cub Bear said, “I am very glad I am 
not a little rat, to be eaten up by a wicked old owl.” 

But the Circus Bear said, “You know that owls 
eat rats, and mice, and little birds, and things of 
that kind; but this owl is a very good, kind owl, and 
I am surprised that he would harm one of the white 
rats from the circus; but I guess he is very hungry, 
because he has been sitting up there a long while 
with nothing to eat.” 

Then the Cub Bear said, “We are going to try 
to build a house big enough for all the animals, so 
if they come to see us, we will have a place for them 
to stay. We think there is a large cave, large 
enough for us all, back of this cave, but we don’t 
know. Can you help us?” 

Then the muskrat said, “I should be very glad to 
help you if I can, because your brother was very 
good to me when we were in the circus.” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “What can you do?” 

And the muskrat said, “I can climb through this 
round hole here and see what there is in there.” 

So he scampered through the hole where the 
giraffe had looked, and was gone a long, long while, 
and they all waited and wondered why he didn’t come 
back. Finally the muskrat did come back, but he 
was all wet, and all the animals wondered why. 

The little Cub Bear said, “What did you find?” 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 77 


The muskrat said: “I found the most beau¬ 
tiful cave in the whole world. It has a level, 
smooth floor, and is nice and clean, and there are 
beautiful columns that come down from the roof 
to the floor of the cave, just like the pillars in a 
great palace, and away back in the back part of 
the cave there is a beautiful stream of clear, cold 
water. I had a fine swim in it. This cave is large 
enough for all the animals in the circus. There is 
one place back in the cave that is big enough for 
all the circus tents of the circus we used to be in.” 

And the Circus Bear said, “My! That is grand,” 
because he knew how large the tents were. 

And the little Cub Bear said, “My! That is 
grand,” because his brother had said the same 
thing, and he knew it must be so. 

Then the animals began to plan how they could 
get into this cave. Finally they all agreed that if 
they could make the opening of the den large 
enough for the elephant to get in, and if the rhi¬ 
noceros should come with his great horn, and some 
more of the animals would come, that they surely 
could get into this cave. 

So that night the elephant worked as hard as 
he could with his tusks and his trunk, and all the 
bears worked carrying out rock and stones, and 
digging out roots with their claws; and the monkey 
scampered around and carried out small rocks, and 
pulled out small roots, and helped some; but he 


78 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


kept pulling the elephant’s tail every once in a 
while, and was more bother than he was help; just 
like some boys that you know. But finally they 
got the mouth of the den large enough so the ele¬ 
phant could come in. He came in and sat down, 
and then there was hardly room enough for any 
other animal. 

The poor little Cub Bear and the Circus Bear 
were squeezed up tight against the wall, and Papa 
and Mamma Bear had to get way back, in the back 
part of the cave; and the monkey had to hang to a 
root way up on the top of the cave. But by turning 
around slowly, the elephant found that he could use 
his tusks and trunk to move some of the rocks. 

They all worked hard until they were tired, and 
were nearly through into the cave, and had made 
the room so much larger, that they all had room 
to sit down and talk. 

The next morning early the little Cub Bear heard 
the “Bang, bang!” of the beaver’s tail, and rushed to 
the mouth of the cave, and there he saw a very large 
animal, with two horns on the end of his nose, and a 
funny looking skin, hard and horny. He knew at 
once that the animal was the rhinoceros the lion had 
told about the night before. 

The owl said, “Who-o-o? who-o-o-o?” and the 
animal answered with a terrible snort and r-o-a-r. 
Then the rhinoceros came to the mouth of the cave, 
and the little bear said: 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 79 


“I am very glad that you came, because we 
are trying to build a house that will be large enough 
to hold all of the animals that used to live in the 
circus, and the giraffe tells us that there is a large 
cave back of this cave, and if we can only break 
through, we will have a house that will be big 
enough for us all.” 

Then the rhinoceros said, “What can I do? for I 
would like to help. Your brother was very good 
to me when we were in the circus, and I would be 
very glad to do anything that I can.” 

The little Cub Bear said, “I think that with that 
great horn of yours you could help to tear out 
some of the dirt and rocks, and the monkeys and 
the bears could then carry them out. Perhaps the 
elephant could be hitched to the chariot, and we 
could carry out some of the dirt and rocks in it.” 

The rhinoceros said that he would be very glad 
to do this. 

That night, after the animals were through with 
their work, the little Cub Bear, who was the greatest 
fellow for stories that you ever saw, began to tease 
his papa for another story about the “Little-Club- 
Foot-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his-papa.” Finally, 
the Papa Bear said that he would tell a story, if 
the little Cub Bear would promise to go right to 
bed as soon as he was through with the story. Of 
course the little Cub Bear said that he would, so 
Papa Bear told him the story of: 


THE “LITTLE-CLUB-FOOT-BEAR-THAT- 
WOULD-NOT-MIND-HIS-PAPA” AND 
THE DYNAMITE 


wyOU know that little cub bears like to eat/’ 
JL said the Papa Bear to his little Cub Bear. 
“But the ‘Little-Club-Foot-Bear-that-would-not- 
mind-his-papa’ once found a tallow candle, and he 
ate it all up, and it tasted as good to him as a stick 
of candy does to a little boy, and so always after 
that he was looking for tallow candles. 

“Not far from where the little bear lived, there 
was a mine, where miners were digging in the 
rock to see if they couldn’t get out some gold; and 
the miners had candles to use, so that when they 
were away in the mine, where it was dark, they 
could light a candle and see to work. One time 
the little Club-Foot-Bear found a whole box of 
candles, and he took eight or ten candles out, and 
carried them home and ate them. And when his 
papa found it out, he told him not to go there 
any more, because he might get hurt. The ‘Little- 
Club - Foot - Bear - that - would -not-mind - his-papa’ 
stayed away from the mine for a long time. 

“But one day, after he had eaten all the candles 
up, he thought he would like to go back again and 

see if he could not find some more. So he went 

80 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 81 


and he found another box of candles, as he thought. 
They looked almost like the other candles, but they 
were not so white; they were yellow and covered 
with paper. If the little Club-Foot-Bear could have 
read as little boys can, he would have seen these 
letters on the box: ‘D-y-n-a-m-i-t-e/ Just as he got 
his arms full of these candles, as he thought, he 
heard the men coming, and he ran over to a tree 
and climbed the tree as fast as he could, with his 
arms full of these yellow candles. He got nearly 
to the top of the tree on a big limb, and there he 
sat and waited. The men came out, but they went 
back into the mine. The little Club-Foot-Bear took 
a big bite, but the very first chew he took, he found 
that it did not taste right at all. So he spit it out, 
and then he thought he would throw the rest down, 
because he did not like them, and wanted to get 
home as fast as he could. So he threw the whole 
armful of yellow sticks right down on to a rock. 
And when it struck the rock, what do you suppose 
happened? 

“ ‘Bang!’ 

“A bigger noise than all the firecrackers in the 
world put together would make, and the rocks began 
to fly through the air, and the tree jumped right out 
of the ground and began to fall down, down, down, 
the side of the mountain. The bear hugged the 
tree as tightly as he could, but it kept falling. And 
finally it fell ‘kersplash !’ right into the river. 


82 THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 

“The little bear was terribly frightened, and was 
nearly drowned, but he scrambled out on to the tree 
as fast as he could and you never saw a little bear 
run so fast in your life. He could not have run 
faster, if all the dogs you ever saw had been run¬ 
ning after him. And when he got home to his den, 
he ran to the very darkest part, and there he 
covered his eyes and his ears with his paws, but all 
the time he could hear a great ringing in his ears, 
and the terrible, ‘Bang! bang! bang!’ That night, 
after the little Club-Foot-Bear finally went to 
sleep, he suddenly made a great jump, and jumped 
clear over his Papa Bear, and pretty nearly out of 
the den. After that you never could get that ‘Little- 
Club-Foot-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his-papa’ to eat 
candles.’' 

After the Papa Bear had finished the story of 
the “Little-Club-Foot-Bear-that-would-not-mind-his- 
papa,” he said, “Little Cub Bear, what do you think 
of that story?” And the little Cub Bear scratched 
his head and said, “I am glad the little bear wasn’t 
killed.” And the little Cub Bear ran off and went 
to sleep. 

During the night he dreamed, and several times 
he gave a jump, just as though he were going to 
jump out of bed. Can you guess what he was 
dreaming about? 

The next morning the little Cub Bear said to his 
papa that he had noticed a box marked just like 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 83 


the box from which the “Little-Club-Foot-Bear-that 
would-not-mind-his-papa” had eaten the things that 
looked like candles. The box had been left by some 
miners away back in the woods, and had in big 
letters on it the word “D-y-n-a-m-i-t-e.” 

When the Papa Bear heard this, he began to 
think and to scratch his head. He was thinking 
that if the stuff in the box had knocked the big 
tree down, perhaps it would help them to knock the 
rocks down, so that they could get into the beauti¬ 
ful cave. The Papa Bear was wondering about it, 
when he saw the old owl looking so solemn and 
wise. Then he said to himself, “I will ask the wise 
old owl. He can’t help much digging into the cave, 
but as he is the wisest bird in the world, maybe he 
can tell me what to do with this stuff that knocks 
great trees down.” 

So the Papa Bear said to little Susie Bear, “Run 
and tell the old owl that I want to ask him a ques¬ 
tion.” 

So Susie Bear ran out as fast as she could and 
said to the owl, “Papa wants you to come into the 
cave, so that he can ask a question of you.” 

And the old owl looked wise and said, “Who-o-o-o? 
who-o-o-o?” 

And Susie Bear said, “You-ou-ou-ou, you-ou-ou- 
ou-ou.” 

The old owl solemnly winked his great eyes, and 
slowly flapped his great wings, and flew to the 


84 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


cave. “Well, we-1-1, w-e-1-1,” said the owl; “I am 
very glad to come into the cave, for you know that 
the light hurts my eyes, and I usually go out only 
at night. What can I do for you?” 

The Papa Bear then told the owl what he had 
been thinking about. 

The owl said very wisely, “I am sure that the 
stuff will knock down the rocks, for I have seen 
miners use it, and it makes the rocks fly so that 
they have to run a great way off, to keep from 
getting hurt. I think if you could get some of the 
stuff, you would find you could soon get into the 
beautiful cave that we all want to see.” 

The Papa Bear asked the elephant if he was will¬ 
ing to go with the little Cub Bear to find the box. 
The elephant Jumbo said that he would be glad 
to go, because the animals had all been so good to 
him in the circus. 

Jumbo got down on his knees, and the little Cub 
Bear climbed up on his back, and away they went 
to find the box that had in it such wonderful stuff. 
They went a long, long way, and finally the little 
Cub Bear saw the box and pointed it out to Jumbo, 
who carefully picked it up with his trunk and with 
his tusks, just as he had the bales of hay, and 
carried it back toward the den. When they were 
coming back, what do you suppose they saw? 

The funniest little animal that the little Cub 
Bear had ever seen. It was nearly as big as a 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 85 


pig, but it looked like a great mouse. Its front 
legs were very short, like small arms, while its 
hind legs were very long. Its tail was as large 
around as a man’s arm. And then it had a pocket, 
only the pocket was in front, as the animal stood 
up, instead of on the sides as boys’ pockets are. 
And what in the world do you suppose was in this 
pocket? Another little baby animal just like the 
big one. All you could see of the little fellow was 
his head peering out of the pocket. 

As they stopped to watch the animals, the little 
fellow hopped out of the pocket, and took two little 
hops, and then when he saw the elephant, scampered 
back as fast as he could. The elephant told the little 
Cub Bear that this animal was the greatest jumper 
in the whole world. And while the elephant was 
telling this to the little Cub Bear, the animal saw 
the elephant, and was so glad to see his old friend 
Jumbo, that with two great jumps it reached Jumbo, 
and with the third, jumped clear over the elephant, 
bear and all. 

Jumbo said, “How do you do, Madam Kangaroo 
and the little baby kangaroo?” 

And the kangaroo said, “Very well, thank you.” 

Jumbo then told the kangaroo where they were 
going and what they were going to do. 

Madam Kangaroo said, “It is very fortunate that 
you found me, for when you drop a rock on the 
stuff to make it go off, you will want some one that 


86 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


can jump out of the way quicker than scat, and 
no one can jump as well or as fast as I can.” 

They hurried back to the cave, and here they 
found all the animals waiting for them. While they 
were away the alligator had come, but he had gone 
down to the beaver’s dam to stay, because he liked 
the water so well, and he had not had much to play 
and to live in while he was in the circus. 

The Papa Bear told the elephant to hurry up and 
put the stuff in the cave, where they were trying to 
knock the rocks down. The Circus Bear and the 
monkey rolled the box over and over to the place, 
and then the elephant reached in with his trunk and 
put the box just where it should be. Then they 
found that there was no way to drop a stone on the 
box so that it would go off and make the rocks come 
down. The badger said that he would dig a hole 
straight up and down like a well, right over the box, 
so that they could drop a stone straight down on the 
box and make it go off. So he scratched away just 
as he had scratched when he made the chimney, and 
before you knew it, the hole was dug and all was 
ready. The kangaroo took a great stone in his fore¬ 
paws, and stood over the hole ready to drop it on 
the box. The owl told them all that they must get 
as far away as they could, for the rocks would be 
sure to fly, and might hurt them. Then he told the 
beaver that as soon as all were ready, he must strike 
the water with his tail, and the kangaroo would then 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 87 


drop the rock on the box. So the little Cub Bear hid 
behind a tree, and every one got ready. Then there 
was a “Bang! bang!” 

The kangaroo dropped the rock on the box, and 
gave three great jumps out of the way; and there 
was the greatest “Bang!” you ever heard. It made 
more noise than all of the firecrackers you ever saw 
would make, if they should all go off together. My! 
how the little Cub Bear did jump! And when he 
looked around, there was the mule, Jenny, kicking 
and kicking and kicking. She had been hit by a rock. 
It did not hurt much, but, of course, she had to kick 
anyway. As soon as it was safe, all of the animals 
that were there ran down to the cave. The elephant 
went in, and instead of his tail sticking out of the 
cave as it had before the stuff went off, he disap¬ 
peared entirely. The little Cub Bear then ran to 
the cave, for he thought that the elephant had fallen 
into a great hole. 

He could not see the elephant at all, so he called, 
“Jumbo, Jumbo, where are you?” 

“Here I am,” said Jumbo, and his voice sounded 
far away, for the explosion had opened the way into 
the great cave, and the elephant was already far 
back in it. All of the animals came running up, and 
how glad they were to think they had such a beau¬ 
tiful home. The floor was almost as level as the 
floor is in your house. It was a long way up to the 
ceiling or roof. There were great pillars coming 


88 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


down from the roof to the floor, and everything was 
so clean and nice that almost any little hoy or little 
girl would like to have lived there. Then there was 
ever so much room in the beautiful new cave. There 
was room for the great tent, that they all used to 
live in at the circus, to be put up without touching 
the roof. There was that little stream of water that 
the muskrat told them of, where all could drink. 
The animals went out to get their things, and when 
they had put them all in the cave, it was dark and 
time for little bears to go to sleep. 

The little Cub Bear soon went to sleep, and what 
do you think he dreamed about? I do not know. 
Perhaps it was about heaven, whose streets are 
paved with gold, and whose gates are of pearl. Per¬ 
haps, who can tell? 


THE COMING OF THE ANIMAL WITH THE 

LONG NOSE 


T HE next morning the animals got up early, 
and the elephant said he thought that they 
ought to go down where the circus train had been 
wrecked, and see if there was anything more that 
they could bring up and put in the cave, as they had 
plenty of room now. 

But while they were talking about the way they 
would do the work, they heard the beaver’s tail go 
“B-a-n-g, b-a-n-g!” and they all looked up, and what 
do you think they saw? The queerest kind of an 
animal. 

He looked like a small bear, but he had very long 
hair on his back and hind legs, and his front legs 
were much shorter than his hind legs. But that was 
not the queerest thing. 

The little Cub Bear said, “Oh, see his nose! It 
looks as if he had caught the end of his nose in a 
trap, and had pulled and pulled until he had 
stretched his nose like a piece of taffy, and had made 
it as long as my leg. Did you ever see such a long 
nose in the whole world?” 

The elephant said that he had a very long nose. 
But the little Cub Bear said that he wasn’t talking 
about trunks that had fingers and thumbs on the 

89 


90 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


end of them, but that he was talking about real 
noses. Then the Papa Bear and Mamma Bear said 
they never, never in the world thought that any ani¬ 
mal would have such a nose. The Papa Bear asked 
the Circus Bear what the animal was? 

The Circus Bear said, “That is a bear. He is 
called an ant-bear.” 

“Oh!” said the Cub Bear, “I have two aunt-bears, 
and they don’t look a bit like that.” 

“Please don’t interrupt me when I am talking,” 
said the Circus Bear. “This is an ‘a-n-t’-bear, not 
an ‘a-u-n-t’-bear. He is called an ant-bear because 
he eats ants.” 

“Oh, I want to see him eat some of these ants that 
got into the honey, that papa brought home the other 
day.” 

As soon as the ant-bear came near, the little Cub 
Bear ran to him and asked him to show how he ate 
the ants. The ant-bear said that he would be very 
glad to do so, because he had not had a good meal of 
ants for the longest while. In the circus he said 
they fed him on meat. The ant-bear said that he 
liked the taste of ants ever so much better. I would 
not, would you? Well, the little Cub Bear showed 
the ant-bear where the ants lived in a hole in the 
ground. Then he saw why the ant-bear had such 
strong claws, for he dug into the ground very 
quickly. Then what do you suppose that ant-bear 
did? He ran the point of his long nose into the hole 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 91 


where the ants lived, and then stuck out the longest 
tongue you ever saw, way, way down in the hole, 
until it was covered with ants that had stuck to it. 
Then the little Cub Bear saw why the ant-bear had 
such a long nose, and a long tongue that looked like 
a pink rope. Do you see why? 

As soon as the ant-bear had eaten all of the ants, 
the little Cub Bear said, “The ants are such little 
things, I should think you would not get enough to 
eat.” 

But the ant-bear said, “Down in South America, 
where I came from, the ants are larger; they are as 
big as the big red and black ants, and they live in 
houses that are as large as a haycock. I dig into 
these with my strong claws, and eat up bushels and 
bushels of ants at a time.” 

While they were talking they heard the beaver go 
“B-a-n-g, b-a-n-g!” several times, and each time the 
solemn old owl would say, “W-h-o? w-h-o-o-o-o? 
w-h-o-o-o-o?” 

The little Cub Bear counted four times, and 
thought that there must be four animals coming, 
and sure enough, when they came to the den, there 
were four new animals. 

There was the raccoon with his striped tail. He 
was always washing his face. There was a great 
striped tiger almost as large as a lion, and quite as 
fierce looking. There was a leopard, that looked 
something like the tiger, but was not quite so large, 


92 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


and instead of stripes, he was covered with black 
spots. 

Then, over in a corner, was a little thing that 
looked like a soft and beautiful round ball. It 
looked so nice that the little Cub Bear ran right over 
to play with it, and before the Circus Bear could 
stop him, the little Cub Bear had given the little ball 
quite a hard slap. “Ouch! Ouch!!” How the little 
bear did scream and cry. And his poor little foot 
was full of stickers. The Circus Bear scolded the 
Cub Bear. 

“Didn’t you know that that was a porcupine, and 
that he was covered with quills, on purpose to stick 
into people that touched him? You ought to have 
known better.” 

But the little Cub Bear did not see how he could 
have known better, for no one had ever told him 
before, and he had never seen a porcupine before, 
and it looked like a nice ball for little Cub Bear to 
play with. 

So the little Cub Bear thought to himself, “I hope 
my papa will tell me about all of the things that 
hurt little bears, so that I will not get hurt so badly 
again. I am afraid that papas sometimes forget to 
tell their little cubs about the things that hurt. How 
am I going to get these awful quills out, anyway? 
I’ve tried as hard as I can, and I can not get hold of 
the little slippery things with my clumsy claws.” 

The Papa Bear came and tried, and he could not 



The raccoon was always washing his face 




















































































HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 93 


get the quills out. Then the Mamma Bear tried, and 
she worked ever so much longer than the Papa Bear, 
but she could not get the quills out of the little Cub 
Bear’s foot. The Mamma Bear was very angry 
with the “miserable little porcupine,” and wanted 
to give him a hard slap; but she knew that she 
would get her foot full of the quills, and that would 
be worse than ever. 

The porcupine did not care at all, for he said to 
himself, “If they don’t want to get hurt, let them 
leave me alone.” 

But I do not think that was right, do you? Of 
course, they did not want to get hurt. 

Not long after, the monkey came and said, “What 
is the matter?” 

The little Cub Bear then told the monkey how he 
had just touched that mean old porcupine and had 
got his foot full of quills, that no one in the whole 
world could ever get out. 

But the monkey said, “I can get them out all 
right, for you know that I have two hands with 
fingers on them, just like a little boy.” 

So the monkey pulled out all of the quills, and 
after that the little Cub Bear could walk all right. 

But he said to himself, “After this I will let other 
people alone, until I get acquainted with them.” 

I think that is a good rule, don’t you? 

That evening, after dark, the little Cub Bear 
heard the beaver go “Bang, bang!” and he rushed to 


94 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


the mouth of the cave to see who was coming. He 
saw a very strange looking animal coming up the 
path. 

He said, “I see an animal that is about the size of 
a rhinoceros, only he has no horns on the end of his 
nose, and he has the biggest nose I ever saw. It is 
not a long nose, but it is a short, stubby nose, about 
the size of the seat of a chair; the two big nostrils in 
the nose are almost as big around as a base ball. I 
can’t see why the nose is so big. Oh, yes, I can, too, 
for he has just yawned, and he has the longest and 
largest teeth of any animal in the whole world, I 
guess. They are as big around as the leg of a chair. 
His mouth is so large that a little bear could sit 
inside of it. His legs are almost as big around as 
an elephant’s legs, only they are very short.” 

Just then the owl said, “Who-o-o-o? who-o-o-o?” 
The animal did not say a thing, but he gave a great 
snort. 

The Circus Bear said, “I know who that is. That 
is Mr. Hippopotamus. In the circus they called him 
Sam.” 

Just then the hippopotamus came up to the door 
of the cave, and the little Cub Bear said very po¬ 
litely, “Come in, Mr. Hittopotamus.” 

You see, it was such a long word he could not pro¬ 
nounce it right. 

So Mr. Hippopotamus came into the cave, and as 
he did so, he gave a great yawn, which frightened 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 95 


the little Cub Bear so that he ran way back to the 
back part of the cave. 

The hippopotamus said, “Don’t be afraid, little 
Cub Bear, because your brother was very good to 
me when we were in the circus, and I wouldn’t hurt 
you for anything.” 

So the little Cub Bear came back, and he looked 
the hippopotamus over, and saw that he did not have 
any hair on his body at all, and that he was about 
the color of an old slate, and that he had a very 
fierce looking mouth. After a little while the little 
Cub Bear plucked up courage, and he said: 

“Mr. Hittopotamus, we are going to fix up the 
cave for all the animals, and we want to know if you 
can help us?” 

The hippopotamus said, “I would be very glad to 
help you if I can, because your brother was very 
good to me when we were in the circus.” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “What can you do?” 

“Well,” he said, “I don’t know. I can’t dig in the 
dirt, because when I am at home I live in the water. 
Sometimes I stay all day in the water, with nothing 
but the end of my nose above the surface, and then I 
can stay under the water a long while without com¬ 
ing to the surface at all.” 

The Cub Bear said, “That is just like the whale.” 

s 

And the hippopotamus said, “Yes, just like the 
whale; only when I come to the surface, I don’t 
make such a big blowing sound as the whale does.” 


96 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


Well, the little Cub Bear thought a long while, 
and he couldn’t think of anything the hippopotamus 
could do. 

So he said to his papa, “Papa, can you tell me 
what the hittopotamus can do to help us in building 
our house?” 

And the Papa Bear said, “I don’t know. I think 
if he would go down and live in the lake above the 
dam that the beaver built, that would be the best 
place for him, and he could help the beaver to make 
the dam higher, and then when the beaver went to 
sleep the hippopotamus could make some kind of a 
noise to warn us when people were coming.” 

So the hippopotamus agreed that he would do 
this, and he went down to the lake. Just before he 
left he said, “I am very hungry, and I would like 
something to eat.” 

The little Cub Bear said, “We have plenty of meat 
here, if you would like some meat.” 

The hippopotamus said, “I don’t eat meat. I eat 
grass like a horse, only the grass I eat I get way 
down under the water.” 

The little Cub Bear said, “Then you will find 
plenty to eat down in the lake.” 

And the hippopotamus went away to the lake, 
where he got acquainted with the beaver, and 
planned to live there as long as the animals were 
living in the forest. 


THE MONKEY’S STORY OF HIS MOST 

NARROW ESCAPE 


'''HE next evening the Cub Bear and all the ani¬ 
mals were sitting in the cave, just before the 
little Cub Bear was to go to bed, and the little Cub 
Bear teased his papa for a story, but his papa said 
he was too tired to tell a storv, for he had hunted all 
day, trying to find a honey tree, and had not found 
one. The little Cub Bear kept on teasing for a 
story, but his papa said he was so tired he could not 
think of a story to tell. 

Then the monkey said, “I will tell you a story, 
little Cub Bear, if you wish me to.” 

And the Cub Bear said, “Yes, tell me a story of 
your most narrow escape from death.” 

“Well,” said the monkey, “I once belonged to a 
man who owned a drug store, in a large city. He 
had another monkey, named Jim, and a parrot. The 
parrot was a large, green bird, and he had learned 
to talk like a man. He could say, ‘Good-by,’ ‘Good- 
day,’ ‘Good-night,’ ‘Polly wants a cracker,’ and ‘See 
what you did.’ 

“One day Jim and the parrot and I were all down 
in the cellar, and the druggist forgot and shut the 
door, so that we had to stay down there. But we 

had a fine time, running about and jumping over 

97 




98 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


everything that came in the way. We jumped up 
to the ceiling, and jumped from one beam to an¬ 
other, and then down to the floor. I pulled Jim’s 
tail and ran away. He would run after me and pull 
mine, and jump away quickly. And once or twice 
the parrot got hold of us, but he really hurt us with 
his great bill and his claws, so that we kept out of 
his way most of the time. In fact, he hurt me so 
badly once, that I pulled a couple of his tail feathers 
out, just to show him how it felt. 

“Jim and I were scampering across the floor, 
when we struck a great carboy—a great bottle— 
larger than a pail, and knocked it over on the cement 
floor, where it broke. The stuff that was in it ran 
out on the floor. And the parrot said, ‘See what you 
did! See what you did !’ 

“This big bottle had on it in large letters ‘S-u-1- 
p-h-u-r-i-c A-c-i-d.’ We were sorry that we had 
tipped over the bottle, but we didn’t feel very bad 
until Jim found that he had some of the stuff on the 
end of his tail, and it was burning him terribly. It 
burned so much that he tried to run away from the 
end of his tail. But he was so careless in jumping 
about, that he struck another big carboy sitting on 
the floor, and he knocked that over, too, and spilled 
the stuff that was in it. 

“And the parrot said, ‘See what you did! See 
what you did!’ 

“This bottle had on it in big letters, ‘N-i-t-r-i-c 



HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 99 


A-c-i-d.’ This stuff ran out all over the floor, and 
ran into a hole in the center of the floor, that was 
shaped something like a bowl. I got some of it on 
my foot, and it didn’t feel very good. So I com¬ 
menced to run around, too, and jump up to the ceil¬ 
ing, and thought I would keep off the floor. 

“There we found a great big can filled with 
glycerine. Do you know what glycerine is? It 
tastes sweet, like honey. I dipped my foot in the 
glycerine, to see if it would stop the smarting, and 
Jim put the end of his tail in it, too. But we were 
so excited, that the first thing we knew, we tipped 
over the entire can of glycerine on the floor, and 
that went into the same hole where the other stuff 
was. 

“And the parrot said, ‘See what you did! See 
what you did!!’ 

“After we tipped over the glycerine, we noticed a 
horrible smell, so Jim and I and the parrot all went 
back in the corner, as far away as we could get, and 
stayed there about two hours. But after a while, 
Jim’s tail hurt him so badly, and the smell was so 
awful, that he commenced to run around in the 
most reckless way. He jumped all over the cellar, 
and finally, just as he was over this hole, where all 
the stuff had been spilled, he knocked down a great 
stone jug, and that dropped right into the stuff, and 
there was the most awful explosion that you can 
imagine. The drug store and everything in it was 



100 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


blown away up into the air, and poor Jim flew up 
so high that we never saw him again. 

“The parrot was terribly frightened, but when he 
looked up and saw Jim go up out of sight in the air, 
he said, ‘Good-by, good-by.’ And then he looked over 
at me, and saw that nearly all of my hair was 
burned off, and he looked at himself, and saw that 
his feathers were nearly all gone. He said: ‘See 
what you did! See what you did! See what you did!' ” 

When the monkey had finished his story, the little 
Cub Bear said: 

“Well, what was it that made such a terrible ex¬ 
plosion?” 

The monkey said, “I don’t know; but afterward 
I saw some men walking around the ruins of the 
drug store, and they saw a broken carboy and an 
empty can of glycerine, and they said the stuff must 
have become mixed, and made nitro-glycerine.” 

Then the little Cub Bear said, “That stuff must be 
a good deal like the stuff we found in the box that 
opened the way into the beautiful cave for us.” 

And the monkey said, “Yes, I heard one man say 
that nitro-glycerine and dynamite were the same; 
that dynamite was just nitro-glycerine mixed with 
a kind of clay.” 

The next night, just before bedtime, little Cub 
Bear said he wanted to hear the story the little bird 
had promised to tell them. All of the animals said 
they wanted to hear it, too, so the little bird began: 



THE STORY OF THE LITTLE BIRD’S ESCAPE 

FROM THE ALLIGATOR 

^"VTOU see, I am a very small bird, and I live in 
JL a very peculiar way. Almost all day I spend 
my time in the open mouth of the great alligators as 
they lie on the shore of the river, basking in the sun. 
You see, they keep their mouths open for me, so that 
I can pick up the little flies and bugs that torment 
them very much. These I eat, and so both the alli¬ 
gator and I are pleased. The alligator is very care¬ 
ful not to hurt me, for, you see, if he should close 
that great mouth it would kill me. 

“Well, one day the alligator went to sleep as I was 
hopping about on his great tongue, and he dreamed 
that he was in the water swimming after a big fish. 
In his dream he thought he was near the fish and 
just going to catch it, and ‘Snap!’ down came his 
great upper jaw right on top of the poor little bird 
in his mouth. I expect you wonder why I was not 
killed. Well, the alligator had a hole in the roof of 
his mouth just large enough for me to get through, 
and it happened that I was right under it, when his 
mouth closed, so I got out through the hole.” 

“How did he happen to have such a hole in his 

s 

mouth? Do all alligators have such holes in the roof 

of their mouths?” said the little Cub Bear. 

101 


102 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


“No,” replied the bird, “but a man once tried to 
catch this alligator. He took a stick that was sharp 
at both ends, and nearly as big around and as long 
as his forearm, and when the great alligator swam 
after him to catch and eat him up, the man turned 
around and thrust his arm with the pointed stick 
into the alligator’s mouth. As the alligator’s jaws 
came together with a snap, the stick went clear 
through his upper jaw, and although the alligator 
got away, and got the stick out, the hole was always 
there, and that hole saved my life.” 

“Well,” said the Cub Bear, “I think I’d rather live 
in a safer place than an alligator’s mouth.” 

That night the little Cub Bear slept very soundly, 
and was out early next morning, wondering whether 
any more animals would come. Soon he heard a 
noise, as if some kind of an animal was coming up 
the path, but he could not see what it was. 

Suddenly he said, “I see the strangest thing; it 
looks like a bird’s head on a long pole. The eyes are 
as big as large marbles; the long pole-like neck 
seems to have hair on it. The bill is much bigger 
than a goose’s bill.” 

Just then its body came into sight. 

“It has a beautiful tail of black and white feath¬ 
ers, and small wings with beautiful feathers. Its 
neck is as long as a yard stick, and its legs are cov¬ 
ered with great scales, and are as long as its neck.” 

Just then this strange bird or animal saw an ear 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 103 


of corn lying in the path, and lowered its queer head 
to the ground, and began to swallow it. The ear of 
corn was larger around than the animal’s neck, but 
it swallowed the ear whole without chewing it. The 
little Cub Bear was too much surprised to say any¬ 
thing, so he watched and could see the ear of corn 
going down the throat of this queer animal. The 
skin of the neck stretched so that the ear of corn 
could go down. It started down in the front of the 
neck, and then twisted around to the back of the 
neck and disappeared into the top of its body. 

The owl called out, “Who-o-o-o? who-o-o-o?” but 
this strange animal did not reply. The little Cub 
Bear told the Circus Bear about the corn, and he 
said: 

“Oh, I know who that is; that is the ostrich.” 

So the little Cub Bear said to him very politely, 
“Come in, Mr. Ostrich. We have a beautiful cave, 
and we would like to have you live with us.” 

But the ostrich said that he would stay a while, 
but that he liked to lie out-of-doors, and that if 
any one came to capture him he would hide his head 
behind a bush, or in the sand, and he would be all 
right. 

“But,” said the little Cub Bear, “they could see 
your great body, and so could capture you.” 

But the ostrich said, “Never mind; that’s'my 
way.” 

So the ostrich stayed many days. There was not 


104 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


corn enough for him to eat, but the bears found that 
he could eat apples, or oranges, or hay, or grass; in 
fact, one day the little Cub Bear found the ostrich 
at the scene of the train wreck, picking up all sorts 
of things to eat, and, strange to say, eating broken 
window glass and pieces of iron and stone. 

What a strange dinner that was! 

When the little Cub Bear returned to the cave 
that night, he noticed the striped tail of the raccoon, 
and at once asked the raccoon to tell how he was 
caught and put into the circus. So the raccoon 
stopped washing his face long enough to tell the true 
story of: 


HOW THE RACCOON WAS CAUGHT 


66 \\ I ELL,” said the raccoon, “I don’t remember 

W when I lived in the forest, or any time be¬ 
fore I was caught. When I opened my eyes, I found 
that I was living in a house where there were a man 
and woman, several little girls, and a boy named 
Ray; and the only thing I know about the way I 
was caught is what I heard the boy say. 

“The boy said that one time he was hunting 
through the woods, and he saw a nest, way up on 
the top of a tree. He climbed up the tree, and there 
he found two little coons, myself and my little 
brother. We had just been born, and neither of us 
had opened our eyes yet. He carried us home to his 
house; and we were crying for something to eat. 
We cried and cried and cried. And the little boy 
didn’t know what to do with us or how to feed us. 
But, finally, he left us with an old cat that had just 
had some little kittens. Very soon we found that 
the old cat was willing to give us something to eat, 
and she nursed us, just as she did her own little 
baby kittens. The first thing I saw, when I opened 
my eyes, was this dear old cat who had been a 
mother to me and to my little brother. But we 
grew so fast that we were soon nearly as big as the 
cat. 


105 


106 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


“I remember one time my brother ran after the old 
cat for his breakfast, and she didn’t want him to 
have any, but he was so big and strong that he 
rolled her over and thought he was surely going to 
get his breakfast. The old cat began to spit and 
scratch and bite at him, and my brother ran away 
as fast as he could. 

“After that neither one of us ever got another meal 
from that old cat, because when we came near her, 
she would box our ears, and if we tried to get any¬ 
thing to eat, she would scratch and bite us. After 
that we got very hungry, but finally the boy bought 
a rubber nipple at the store and put it on an old 
bottle he found in the house; then he filled the bottle 
with milk and gave it to my brother; and you would 
have laughed to see that little coon sit up, just like 
a little boy, and hold the bottle up to his mouth and 
suck, and suck, and suck, until all the milk in the 
bottle was gone. And then when the bottle was 
empty, the boy Ray filled it again and gave it to me, 
and I did the same thing. After that, two or three 
times every day, this boy would give us a bottle of 
milk, just as he would feed a little baby. And we 
ate and ate and grew and grew, until the first thing 
we knew, we were full grown, almost as large as a 
dog. 

“One day, my brother and I saw some chickens out 
in the back yard. We never had eaten anything in 
our lives but milk, but the first thing we knew, we 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 107 


found ourselves running after a chicken, and we 
caught it and killed it, and ate it all up, and the boy 
came out and found us all covered with feathers. 
He scolded us like everything. He said that that 
was his little pet chicken that he wanted to keep 
always—a beautiful white bantam. And after that, 
he put us in a cage until he got a chain, and ever 
since that time, we have either been in a cage or had 
a chain around us, to keep us from killing chickens, 
or doing things that people did not want us to do. 

“Finally, a man came along and saw us and said 
he wanted to put us in the circus. And the boy sold 
us to the man, and that is how we got acquainted 
with all the other animals. We have been very 
happy and contented all our lives, because men have 
always given us all we wanted to eat, and taken 
good care of us, and while we are glad now that we 
can climb trees and run around in the woods, still 
we remember that the men were very kind to us.” 

As the little Cub Bear went off to bed he said, 
“Well, I guess that is the best way, to be caught 
before you are big enough to know anything about 
the woods and the mountains and the hillsand the 
coon said, “That is true.” 

The next day the monkey was telling the little 
Cub Bear about the chariot races they had in the 
circus—how the men would hitch up four beautiful 
snow-white horses to one chariot, and four coal-black 
horses to another chariot, and then race around 


108 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


and around the track in the circus; and how every¬ 
body in the circus would be as excited as could be. 

The little Cub Bear said, “Why can’t we have a 
race? You know the four beautiful black horses are 
down at the foot of the mountain, in a little valley, 
and the four snow-white horses are down at the foot 
of the mountain, in another valley. Perhaps we can 
get them up here and run a race. I will drive one 
chariot.” 

And then the monkey said, “You never learned 
how to drive horses. I learned how in the circus.” 

But the little Cub Bear was a very brave little 
bear, and he said he would try anyway. 

So the next morning, they went down to see if 
they could get the horses to come up and run the 
chariot race. Jumbo saw them, and asked where 
they were going. The monkey told him, and Jumbo 
said that was fine. He would be very glad to act as 
judge of the race, and that he would go half way 
down the mountain and draw a line, and that the 
first one to get over the line would win the race. 

So the monkey went down and told the black 
horses and the white horses what they wanted, and 
they all agreed that it would be great fun to come 
up and run a race, just as they used to in the circus. 
So they all came up to the den; and they were the 
most beautiful horses you ever saw. It took the 
monkey a long while to hitch up the horses. The 
bears helped him all they could. 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 109 


All four of the white horses were hitched to one 
of the red and gold chariots, and the four black 
horses were hitched to the other red and gold char¬ 
iot ; and the monkey chose the white horses, and the 
little bear chose the black horses. The monkey got 
into his chariot and took the reins, and little Cub 
Bear climbed into his chariot and took the reins, and 
looked over to see how the monkey held them, and he 
tried to hold them the same way. 

Then the monkey said, "How are we going to 
know how to start, so we can both start together?” 

And the Circus Bear said, “I will tell you what to 
do. We will get the beaver to slap his tail on the 
water, and that will be just as good as firing a pis¬ 
tol. When you hear the noise, you both start at the' 
same time.” 

So the muskrat ran down and told the beaver 
what to do. And little Cub Bear and the monkey 
waited, all ready to start the moment they heard the 
noise. 

Soon there was a sharp “Bang!” and the horses 
all started, just as though they had been shot out of 
a gun. The Cub Bear let go the reins the very first 
thing, and just hung on to the chariot for dear life. 
The monkey looked over and laughed. The black 
horses were getting ahead of the white ones, for 
they were running down hill at a terrible rate. Papa 
Bear came out of the cave just then, and he was 
dreadfully frightened, because he felt that his little 


110 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


Cub Bear would surely be killed. But the horses 
had run so many times that they were not afraid at 
all. They were going like the wind. First the white 
horses would be a little ahead, and then the black 
horses would be a little ahead. 

The little Cub Bear hung on as tight as he could, 
and he looked straight ahead of him. Suddenly he 
saw a stump right in the way ahead. The horses 
saw it at the same time, and two of the horses went 
on one side of the stump and two on the other, and 
the chariot ran right into the stump with a terrible 
smash and crash, and broke the chariot all to pieces. 
One wheel rolled down hill one way, and the other 
wheel rolled down the hill the other way, and two of 
the black horses went in one direction and two of the 
black horses went in the other direction, and the 
bear went right up in the air. 

When his papa looked to see what had happened, 
he saw him come down just like a rubber ball, all 
rolled up; and he rolled on down the hill. 

And just when the monkey thought he surely 
would win the race, he saw a great stone ahead of 
him, and two white horses went on one side of the 
stone and two white horses on the other, and the 
chariot ran “Smash!” right into the stone, and two 
white horses ran in one direction and two white 
horses ran in the other direction, and one chariot 
wheel rolled down the mountain one way and the 
other chariot wheel rolled down the mountain the 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 111 


other way, and the monkey went right up in the air, 
just as though he had been shot out of a gun. 

The elephant was standing at the line, and just as 
the monkey flew past him in the air, he reached out 
and caught hold of the monkey’s tail with the thumb 
and finger on the end of his trunk, and swung him 
on top of his back. And just as he caught the mon¬ 
key by the tail, the bear rolled across the line like a 
great big rubber ball. And that was the end of the 
race. The elephant never could make up his mind 
which won the race, the monkey or the bear. Which 
one do you think won the race? 


THE ANIMALS PLAN HOW THEY WILL DE¬ 
FEND THEMSELVES AGAINST 
THE CIRCUS MEN 


O NE night the animals were all seated around 
in the beautiful cave, wondering why the men 
had not come to take them back to the circus. And 
they all said that if the men came they never would 
go. And the lion said that if a man came to get 
him, he would just hit him one terrible blow with 
his paw, and if that didn’t kill him, he would just 
take the man’s head in his mouth and bite as hard as 
he could, and that would be the end of the man. 
And then the tiger said that he would hide in the old 
dead tree where the owl sat, and when the man 
came, he would jump on him, and bite him, and 
scratch him until there was nothing left of him. 
And then the leopard said that if the man came, he 
would hide in another tree farther down, and he 
would wait and wait, and when the man got right 
under the limb, he would jump on him and bite him, 
and scratch him until nothing was left of him. 

Then the kangaroo spoke up and said, “If the 
man gets after me, I will run as fast as I can, and if 
he is on horseback, and gets near to me, I will take 
my little kangaroo by the tail and throw him away 
out in the weeds, where they can’t find him at all. 
And then I will go faster and faster.” 

112 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 113 


The little Cub Bear said, “Suppose he should catch 
you in a corner, where you couldn’t get away, what 
would you do?” 

The kangaroo said, “I would stand on my hind 
legs, and I would wait until he came right up close, 
and when he got close to me, I would just strike 
out with my sharp three-cornered claws, and if he 
got too near they would cut him just like a knife, 
and I guess that man would think that he didn’t 
want any more kangaroo.” 

Then the rhinoceros said that if he saw a man 
coming, and couldn’t run away, he would get right 
up close to him and stamp on him and bite him, and 
that he might use that long horn on the end of his 
nose to toss him up in the air. 

Old Jumbo said, “I would just take that man by 
one leg and throw him up in the air so high that 
when he came down there wouldn’t be anything left 
of him; and if there was anything left, I would step 
on him and run my tusks into him, and I guess he 
wouldn’t want any more elephant.” 

Then the beaver said he would swim under the 
water so that nobody could see him, and he would 
get right under his house, and come up through the 
little hole that was in the bottom of his house under 

the water, and hide, and they wouldn’t know where 

/ 

he was. And the badger said he would get in a hole 
and hide. And all the other animals told what ter¬ 
rible things they would do to this man, when he 


114 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


came to try to take them back to the circus, because 
they all said they would rather live out in the open 
air under the trees, and in the beautiful cave, than 
to be taken back to the circus. 

And when they had all finished, the little bear 
said, “Well, I am glad I am not the man, because I 
wouldn’t want to be killed in so many different 
ways.” 

While they were talking, they heard a “Bang! 
Bang!” and the little Cub Bear ran to the mouth of 
the cave; and what do you think he saw? 

A three-legged bear. He called the Papa Bear, 
and when he came to the mouth of the cave, he saw 
that the poor bear looked tired out and very thin, 
but soon he saw that it was Jimmie Bear, his own 
son that had been away for so long a time from 
home. So he called the Mamma Bear and the Circus 
Bear and said: 

“Come quick! Come quick! Here is little Jimmie 
Bear, and he is coming back home.” 

The old owl said, “Who-o-o? who-o-o?” just as if 
he had not heard that it was little Jimmie Bear, but 
no one paid the slightest attention to the owl, they 
were all so glad that Jimmie Bear was home again. 

As soon as he came to the mouth of the cave, the 
Papa Bear gave him a great big bear hug, and the 
Mamma Bear gave him a great big bear hug, and 
the dear little Cub Bear gave him a great big bear 
hug, at least as big a hug as a little bear could give, 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 115 


and that was much harder than you can hug, you 
know. 

Of course, the Papa Bear wanted to know all 
about Jimmie Bear, and Jimmie said that he would 
tell him how he happened to go away from home 
and to be gone so long. 


JIMMIE BEAR’S STORY 


(•(• OU remember that when I was a little bear, one 



A day I disobeyed my papa. Papa told me that 
he did not want me to go far away from home that 
day, because there were some great grizzly bears 
coming, and they might want to take a little brown 
bear away with them, if they should happen to see 
him playing away from his home. I thought that I 
would be very careful, for I loved my papa and my 
mamma very much, and I did not want to be taken 
away by a great grizzly bear. But I was interested 
in running around, and I thought I would try to see 
how far I could run without getting tired, so I ran 
and ran, on and on, for a long time, and before I 
knew it I was several miles from home, and I began 
to grow tired. 

“Of course, I remembered at once what my papa 
had told me, and so started home without waiting 
for anything. Before I had gone very far I looked 
at the ground, and I saw that some very large ani¬ 
mal had come that way. The tracks looked like 
great bear tracks, and though I had never seen the 
tracks of a grizzly bear, I thought that these had 
been made by the great grizzly that papa had told 
me about. Of course I was sorry that I had been 
so careless and forgetful. I wanted to get home 


116 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 117 


without seeing the great grizzly, and just as quickly 
as I could. I went another way; but before I had 
gone far, I heard a sound that made my heart go 
pit-a-pat, pit-a-pat, for it sounded like a great griz¬ 
zly bear, and before I could think what to do, the 
grizzly had caught me and told me that he was 
going to take me a long, long way into the woods. I 
asked him to let me go back to the cave to say 
good-by to papa and mamma, but the grizzly said 
that he had not time to let me go, and besides that, 
if both the Papa Bear and the Mamma Bear should 
try to keep me, he might have trouble in getting me, 
even if he were bigger than both of the bears put 
together. 

“So he took me into the far-away land that I am 
going to tell you about. It is a beautiful land, and 
there are the most beautiful trees there, and many, 
many caves where bears could live. I learned to 
love the land very much, and when I grew up, I 
married the most beautiful brown bear in the whole 
world. And we have four of the dearest cubs that 
you ever saw; but I always wanted to see Papa 
Bear, and Mamma Bear, and little Cub Bear, and 
Johnnie Bear, so I have come back, and it is a dread¬ 
ful journey across a desert. There is no water to 
drink, and nothing to eat, and, as you see, I nearly 
died.” 

The animals all wanted to go and see the beau¬ 
tiful land that the three-legged Jimmie Bear told 


118 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


them of, but they were afraid to go for fear that 
they might die of thirst. 

While they were wondering how they would cross 
the desert, they suddenly heard a loud “Bang! 
Bang!” and the little Cub Bear ran to the mouth of 
the cave. 

He said, “I see some very strange animals. They 
have the funniest necks—almost as long as the 
giraffe’s, but curved instead of straight, and their 
heads are very different from the giraffe. The ani¬ 
mals have long hair on their necks, and on their 
backs they have two hills—small ones of course; and 
they walk very quietly; you can scarcely hear the 
animals when they place their feet on the ground.” 

Just then the old owl said, “Who-o-o-o? who-o-o?” 

But the animals did not answer. The Circus 
Bear said that he knew what the animals were; they 
were camels. 

“How many of them are there?” asked the Circus 
Bear. 

And the little Cub Bear began to count, “One, 
two, three, four,” and so on, until he had counted 
twelve camels. 

When the camels came to the cave, the Circus 
Bear told the little Cub Bear to tell them to come in. 
The camels came in, but they said they were not in 
the habit of living in caves. They lived on the 
desert. 

“How can you live on the desert, when there is no 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 119 


water to drink, and nothing to eat there ?” asked the 
little Cub Bear. 

The oldest of the camels replied that the camel 
was a very strange and peculiar animal, and they 
were made so that they could live on the desert, 
where there was nothing to drink and nothing to 
eat. 

Of course, the little Cub Bear wanted to know 
how it was possible for an animal to live without 
anything to eat, and with nothing to drink. But the 
camel told him that they had a place to carry water 
and a place to carry food. He had ten stomachs for 
water, and four stomachs for food. 

The little Cub Bear thought a while, and then 
said that it seemed to him that if the camels could 
live so long on the desert, it would be easy for them 
to get to that new place where the Jimmie Bear 
lived. The old camel said that it would be very 
easy, and that the camels could take not only them¬ 
selves, but that they could carry some of the other 
animals, for they were used to carrying big loads. 
That was why the men wanted them. They used 
the camels instead of the freight trains. So it was 
agreed that the little Cub Bear, and some of the 
other animals, should ride on the camels’ backs, and 
that they would take turns riding. They would 
start at once, as soon as the camels had a good 
chance to take a big drink of water, and fill all four 
of their stomachs with food. 


120 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


But the camels said, “You must be sure that you 
do not stick your sharp claws into our backs.” 

The bears all agreed with the animals that they 
would be very careful, and not dig their claws into 
the camels. 

So they soon started. All of the animals ate and 
drank all that they could hold. The little Cub Bear 
was to ride all of the time, for he was so small and 
so weak. The three-legged bear, too, was to have a 
ride most of the way, for he was very tired, and had 
come so long a journey with only three legs. The 
lion said that he thought he could walk most of the 
way. He was used to the desert. And the camel 
said he was very glad that the lion was going to 
walk, for his claws were very sharp, and he was 
afraid that the lion might forget and stick his sharp 
claws into his back. 

Well, you would have laughed to see the little Cub 
Bear try to get on the camel. The sly old camel 
knew that the little Cub Bear could not climb up, 
but the little fellow was in such a hurry to start, 
that the camel let him try to get on the best way he 
could. 

Finally, the little fellow said, “Dear old camel, 
please tell me how to get on your back.” 

Then the camel said, “Why didn’t you ask me be¬ 
fore? There is only one way that you can get on 
the back of a camel. I will kneel down and show 
you.” 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 121 


But as soon as the camel knelt down, the little 
bear saw at once that he could get on his back, and 
he scrambled up and said: 

“Get up, get up, Mr. Camel.” 

The camel got up, but it was a very funny way 
that he did it. When the camel straightened out his 
hind legs, the little Cub Bear nearly fell off; then 
the camel gave his hind legs another hump, to get 
them real straight, and what do you suppose hap¬ 
pened to the Cub Bear? 

He fell off, and got a great bump on the ground, 
but it did not hurt him very much, and the camel 
tried it again. This time the little Cub Bear man¬ 
aged to stick on. 

The tiger, the kangaroo, the two rats, the ant- 
bear, and the leopard all got on the camels. 

The hippopotamus tried to get on a camel, and he 
looked so odd that all of the animals laughed, and 
told him that he would have to walk anyway, be¬ 
cause he was too big to ride on the back of a camel. 
The hippopotamus said that he thought he would 
stay in the lake the beaver had made; that he could 
not go far from water, for he liked to live in the 
water all of the time. The beaver said that he was 
going to stay, too, and that if any of the men came, 
the hippopotamus could hide under the water, and 
he could go into his little house and stay there out 
of sight until the men had gone away. So they had 
to leave the beaver and the hippopotamus behind. 


122 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


But they all said that some time they would come 
again, to see the hippopotamus and the beaver. The 
badger, the giraffe, and all of the other animals 
started on their long journey to that land where the 
wife and the little cubs of Jimmie Bear lived. 

That night they were all very tired, and they had 
to lie down to sleep without anything to eat or any 
water to drink. All except the little Cub Bear, who 
had some berries in a pail that he had carried on the 
earners back. 

Little Cub Bear wanted them all, but he thought, 
“Poor papa has walked all day, and has had nothing 
to eat or to drink, and the way was very hard.” 

The little Cub Bear was very hungry and very 
thirsty—hungrier and thirstier than you have ever 
been; but he said, very sweetly and very politely, 
“Papa, you may have some of my berries.” 

But the Papa Bear said that he would not take 
any of them. Then the little Cub Bear offered some 
of the berries to the Mamma Bear, but she would 
not take any of the berries. Pie offered some to the 
Circus Bear, and the Circus Bear would not take 
any. Then he offered some to Jimmie Bear, and 
Jimmie Bear took just one. Then the little Cub 
Bear offered some to all of the animals, but no one 
would take any, except the baby kangaroo. 

I rather think that the baby kangaroo would have 
taken all of them, but his mamma would let him 
have only three. So the little Cub Bear had all the 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 123 


rest of the berries, and they tasted ever so much 
better than they would have tasted if he had not 
been willing to share them with the other animals. 
Don’t you think they did? 

The next morning the animals started and trav¬ 
eled all day. That night, just as it was getting 
dark, they came to the edge of the terrible desert, 
and they saw a little stream of water and plenty of 
things to eat, and there they stayed that night. In 
the morning they started again, and soon came to 
the most beautiful trees, and grass, and flowers 
that they had ever seen, and Jimmie Bear pointed 
up to a cave on the mountain side where his wife 
and little bears were. And right there were three 
of the cutest little bears that you ever saw playing 
in the sun. What a noise they made when they saw 
their papa and all of the other animals. The Mam¬ 
ma Bear ran to the mouth of the cave, and how 
happy she was to see Jimmie. The animals were all 
as happy as could be in the beautiful forest, and 
what do you think the little bears of Jimmie Bear 
called the little Cub Bear? They called him “Uncle 
Cub.” 

That night the Cub Bear teased the Circus Bear 
to tell him stories. “I want you to tell me a story 
about the time you took a ride in a great boat.” 

And the Circus Bear said, “I will tell you a story 
about the time we crossed the great ocean and 
went over to another land.” 


HOW THE CIRCUS CROSSED THE OCEAN 


UVOU may not believe it, little Cub Bear, because 

JL there is so much land, so many trees and 
rocks, and so little water where we are, but three- 
fourths of the whole world is covered with water; 
and I am going to tell you about the time that I 
crossed the ocean. 

“The circus was in a great city. The men said it 
was New York. And one day, without our knowing 
anything about it, they rolled the big wagons down 
on the wharf where there was a great ship lying. 
This ship was as large as a dozen houses all put 
together—as large as the circus tents all put to¬ 
gether, but a different shape, of course. And then 
we saw that all the men that belonged to the circus 
were on board the ship. They began to wheel the 
wagons on board, and took the animals out, one at a 
time, and put them in great cages on board the ship. 

“When it came time to put Jumbo on the ship, he 
didn’t want to go. And how do you suppose they 
got him on board? They put great straps under 
him, and then they lowered a great rope from one 
of the masts and fastened it into the strap, and they 
started the engine going, and the first thing Jumbo 
knew, he was hanging in the air like a little toy ele¬ 
phant, and he waved his trunk around wildly and 

124 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 125 


kicked his legs, but it didn’t do him a bit of good. 
And then they hoisted him way up in the air as high 
as a house, and then they swung him right over, and 
lowered him clear through two or three decks, way 
down to the bottom of the ship. And there they 
found a place for him. 

“Then they brought back the straps, and put them 
around the hippopotamus, and lifted him way up in 
the air and swung him over, and lowered him way 
down into the bottom of the ship. And then they 
raised the camel and the rhinoceros, in the same 
way. But the lions they brought aboard, cages and 
all. After all the animals were on board, and all the 
people belonging to the circus were on board, we 
heard a great gong ring, and then the big engines 
began to turn, and the ship began to move. The en¬ 
gine didn’t go, ‘Chu-chu,’ like a locomotive, and there 
was no sound, except, Throb! throb! throb! throb!’ 
which kept up until we were clear across the ocean, 
all day and all night, and the great ship quivered as 
the engine throbbed. 

“But this wasn’t the worst of it. We hadn’t gone 
very far, until everything began to move. The 
cages went up and down, and up and down, and up 
and down, until I got dizzy, and all the other ani¬ 
mals seemed to be dizzy. Then I felt so dreadfully, 
dreadfully sick, that I didn’t want to move or say 
anything to anybody, or look at anybody, or think 
of anything. 


126 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


“Once I opened one eye and looked out, and 1 saw 
that the men were lying around just in the same 
way that the animals were, and they looked awfully 
white and sick, and they didn’t say anything to any¬ 
body, and they didn’t want anything to eat, and we 
didn’t want anything to eat, and I spent all my time 
wishing that the old boat would stop rocking, and 
pitching, and turning, and twisting all the time. 
And the old ship would go down, down, down, and 
just as soon as we would get used to its going down, 
down, down, it would turn and go up, up, up, and 
just as soon as we got used to its going up, up, up, 
it would turn and go down, down, down again. And 
when the ship started up, my stomach wanted to 
stay down, and when the ship would start down, it 
seemed as though my stomach wanted to stay up. 
And so I got terribly sore on the inside, and all the 
other animals seemed to be terribly sore. I hugged 
myself as hard as I could to keep from coming to 
pieces. And I saw all of the other bears hugging 
themselves. All the animals were lying down look¬ 
ing sleepy. Everybody seemed to be sleepy, except 
some of the men who were dressed in blue. 

“They ran about, and whistled, and sang, and blew 
tobacco smoke in our faces, and this made us feel 
terribly sick. But they seemed to be having a splen¬ 
did time. After a while I learned that these were 
the sailors, and that they didn’t mind the ship going 
up and down, and up and down, all the time. 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 127 


After a while we all got so that we didn’t mind it 
much. And then we began to eat. It seemed as 
though we never would get enough. We ate, and 
ate, and ate. We ate more than enough to make up 
for all the time when we didn’t eat anything. And 
some people who looked so pale, and so sick, and so 
weak, seemed to eat and eat and eat, and some of 
them got so fat, before we got to the other side of 
the water, that you would hardly have known them. 

“One day the ship pitched and tossed and rolled 
worse than it ever had, and for some reason the en¬ 
gine stopped. I heard a man say that something 
was broken, and as soon as the engine stopped, it 
just seemed as though that old ship would go to 
pieces. She rose higher and went lower. And one 
time there was a great splash, and the biggest lot of 
water you ever saw came right down where the ani¬ 
mals were. 

“The hippopotamus thought it was fine, until he 
tasted the water, and then he made up the most 
awful face that you ever saw; and you can imagine 
what kind of a face it was, for he is homely enough 
anyway. His nose is bigger than his face, and his 
mouth is right on the end of his nose. I asked him 
what the trouble was, and he said it wasn’t the kind 
of water he liked; it tasted of salt and was bitter. 
It made him feel as though he never wanted to eat 
anything again as long as he lived. 

“I noticed, though, that the seal and the walrus 


128 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


seemed to enjoy it ever so much. I asked them why, 
and they said that was the kind of water they liked; 
that was the kind of water they had always lived in 
—salt water. 

“It seemed a long time, but after a while the en¬ 
gine started up again. Then the ship was more 
quiet, but it kept going up and down, and up and 
down, until we got clear across the water, and then 
we noticed that the deck we were on became as quiet 
and steady as a floor. I heard one of the sailor men 
say that we were coming into a harbor. And sure 
enough, we soon stopped, and the men began to take 
the animals out again. 

“They hung the elephant on the end of a long 
rope, with straps around him, just as they had be¬ 
fore, and the camel, and the hippopotamus, and the 
rhinoceros, and they took us all out and put us on a 
train. Everything looked so green and nice. How 
glad we were to be on shore! But we couldn’t un¬ 
derstand anything the men said, because they all 
talked a different language. It sounded like, ‘Jab¬ 
ber, jabber, jabber, mum-mum-mum.’ 

“I asked the lion, who had been in the circus 
longest, what it meant. He said we were in a new 
country, where everybody talked a different lan¬ 
guage, and that there were lots of other countries, 
where they talked other languages. 

“We stayed in this new country a long while, but 
finally came back. And that is the end of my story.” 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 129 


The little Cub Bear said, “I would like to see the 
ocean, but I don’t think I would ride on a ship, if it 
makes you feel so terribly bad inside.” 

And the Circus Bear said, “You would soon forget 
all about that and just remember the beautiful 
things there are to see. I am glad I went across.” 

Then the little Cub Bear went to bed and went to 
sleep, and that night he dreamed so hard that— 
what do you think happened to him? He rolled clear 
out of bed and fell into a stream in the cave— ker- 
splash! 

The Papa Bear asked him what the trouble was, 
and he said he dreamed that he was on board ship 
and was nearly drowned. Some dreams, you see, 
come true. 

When morning came, the Papa Bear called the 
little Cub Bear to him and said: 

“Now, my little cub, it is time for you to go out 
alone, to see if you can not find something to eat for 
yourself. I think if you go and search carefully, 
you will be able to find some strawberries, and if 
you can not find strawberries, you may be able to 
find some blackberries. Don’t try to eat any of the 
gooseberries that you will see, because the wild 
gooseberries you will find are all covered with stick¬ 
ers, and they will stick in your tongue. If you find 
a tree filled with honey, come back and tell Papa 
Bear, because I think you had better not try yet to 
get the honey out of the tree, for the bees might 



130 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


sting you. And if you find any bumble-bees, be sure 
to let them alone, for they have holes in the ground, 
where they make their honey, and they have very 
long stingers, and they would sting you very hard, 
so you better come home at once and tell papa. But 
if you find the berries, you can eat all you want. 
And if you find a big patch of berries, you better 
come home and tell Mamma Bear, and then we will 
all go and get all the berries we want to eat.” 



“I saw the strangest little animal to-day.” 



























































OUT ALL ALONE 


S O the little Cub Bear started out for the very first 
time in his life all alone, and he did enjoy every¬ 
thing so much. He finally found a patch of berries, 
and there he ate all he wanted, and then he 
went over behind a log and lay down and went to 
sleep. When he awoke, it was nearly dark, and he 
knew that he must hurry home. He started, but 
had gone only a few steps when a little animal 
scampered across the path and ran up a tree. 

The Cub Bear thought he would like to see this 
animal, and so he climbed up the tree after it, and 
there he found a strange looking animal. It had a 
tail something like a rat, but it was a great deal big¬ 
ger than a rat, and bigger than a cat. It had long 
soft fur; but as soon as the little Cub Bear touched 
it, it rolled itself into a ball, and fell to the ground. 
Cub Bear clambered down the tree as fast as he 
could, and there at the foot of the tree he found this 
strange animal all rolled up like a ball. The Cub 
Bear smelt of it, and rolled it over very carefully, 
and looked it all over, but it seemed to be dead, and 
he felt so sorry to think that this little animal was 
dead. 

And when he went home, the first thing he told 
his papa was, “Papa Bear, I saw the strangest little 
animal to-day, and I am very sorry that I killed it.” 

131 


132 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


Then he told the Papa Bear how the little animal 
scampered up the tree, and how it rolled up into a 
furry ball, and how it dropped from the tree and 
seemed to be dead. The Papa Bear said: 

“My dear little Cub Bear, the animal was not 
dead at all. That was just his way of fooling you, 
and making you think that he was dead, so that you 
would not bother him any more. The animal was 
an opossum. That is the way they always do when 
they are frightened, or when they think some one is 
going to take them and hurt them.” 

Then the little Cub Bear told his papa what a fine 
time he had had, and how he had found the berries 
and had eaten all he could, and that he was nearly 
ready to go to sleep. 

Next morning, bright and early, the Papa Bear 
called the little Cub Bear again, for he wanted to 
teach him that he must work for himself, and find 
his own living, and he said: 

“Little Cub Bear, do you want to go again into 
the woods to-day, and see if you can find some more 
berries?” 

And the little Cub Bear said, “Yes, papa, I want 
to go, because I want to learn to work for myself, 
and take care of myself.” 

So the Papa Bear again told him to be very care¬ 
ful, and if he saw any men or any large animals, he 
was to come home as quickly as possible. The little 
Cub Bear said that he would do this, and then he 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 133 


started out joyously in the early morning light, 
while dew was on the ground, to see if he could not 
find another berry patch. And sure enough, before 
he had gone very far, he found a patch full of beau¬ 
tiful blackberries. He ate all he could of these, but 
he got scratched many times on his nose and on his 
paws. It did not hurt him any on his paws, because 
they were thick, but on the end of his nose, where 
the skin was very thin, sometimes the little Cub 
Bear was so badly scratched that he felt like crying. 
But he was a brave little fellow, and did not cry, 
and thought that as soon as he had enough to eat, 
he would go back and tell the Papa and Mamma 
Bear where they could find all they wanted to eat. 

Pretty soon he left the berry patch, thinking he 
would go home a new way, and so he started, and 
very soon came to a beautiful lake, larger than the 
lake that the beaver had made near the den where 
they used to live. It was so wide at some places that 
he could hardly see across the lake. It was one of 
the most beautiful lakes in the world, and the most 
beautiful lake that this little Cub Bear had ever 
seen. The little Cub Bear sat down near a log to 
look at this lake, for it made him very happy and 
contented to see such a beautiful sight. 

While he was waiting, he saw in the air a very 
large bird, larger than a hawk and larger than an 
eagle. This bird seemed to be flying about over the 
water, and around, and around; and the little Cub 


134 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


Bear wondered what this bird was trying to do. The 
most peculiar thing he noticed about the bird was 
that he had such a long bill. The bill was over a 
foot long, much larger than the bill of the ostrich, 
and larger than the bill of a goose, or any bird that 
the little Cub Bear had ever seen. 

All of a sudden, this peculiar bird turned a sort of 
somersault and fell head downward into the water. 
While falling, the bird’s wings were outstretched, 
and when it struck the water, there was a great 
splash and the bird disappeared, but soon reap¬ 
peared floating on the surface, and shaking his head 
in a most peculiar way. The little Cub Bear won¬ 
dered and wondered what the bird was doing. He 
waited until this strange bird began flying again, 
and then he noticed that there were a number of 
other birds which looked just like this one, and that 
they were flying about, and every once in a while 
one of these birds would turn a sort of a somersault 
and fall with outstretched wings into the water with 
a great splash, and then come up, and always bob 
his head in just that peculiar way, as though he 
were nodding at some one. 

The little Cub Bear thought that when he got 
home he would tell the Papa Bear about it, and try 
to find out what kind of a bird it was. So he hur¬ 
ried and got home just as the sun set. 

And when his papa asked him how he got along 
that day, he told him about the blackberry patch, 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 135 


and said that he hoped they would all go the next 
day and get something to eat, for there were plenty 
of berries for all the bears, and for any of the other 
animals who wanted to eat the berries. 

The lion and the tiger both said that they did not 
care for berries, and the hippopotamus, too, said 
that he did not want any berries; the rhinoceros 
did not care for berries, but all the birds and the 
monkey thought it would be fine to go and get some 
of the berries the next day. 

Then the little Cub Bear said: 

“Oh, papa, I almost forgot. I want to tell you 
about the strange bird that I saw to-day, at a big 
lake in the mountains; it was bigger than a hawk, 
or an eagle. The bird had a long bill, and circled 
around, and around, and then turned a somersault, 
and fell with outstretched wings ker-splash into the 
water; and then the bird came up and shook his 
head as though he were nodding to a friend.” 

The Papa Bear said, “Why, I know what that 
was; that was a pelican, and if you had been nearer 
to him, you would have seen a strange bag under his 
bill.” 

The little Cub Bear said, “Well, what was he nod¬ 
ding his head about when he came up out of the 
water?” 

And the Papa Bear said, “You see, the pelican 
dived into the water to get a fish, which he saw 
when he was flying about above the water, and he 


136 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


dove down into the water so straight, that he caught 
the little fish in his bill; and put it in the pouch un¬ 
der the bill, before the little fish could get away. 
And then when he came to the surface, he was nod¬ 
ding his head, so he could throw his bill up into the 
air, and try to get the fish down his throat.” 

Then the Papa Bear said that one time he saw a 
pelican swallow the head of a fish that he had found 
on the beach at the seashore, and this head was 
larger than two baseballs, and when the pelican got 
the head half way down his throat, it stuck there, 
and the poor pelican was in great distress, for he 
could not get the fish’s head up or down. The Papa 
Bear said he did not know what happened to the 
pelican, for at that time two men came up, and the 
Papa Bear had to leave as fast as he could; but he 
thought perhaps these men might have helped the 
pelican to get the fish’s head in his throat either up 
or down. 

The little Cub Bear said, “I think it was very 
foolish of the pelican to try to swallow something so 
big without knowing whether he could get it down 
or not.” 

The Papa Bear said, “You see, we never can tell 
What we can do, until we try, and that is a good way 
to learn, if we are careful enough about our trying.” 

Again, the next morning, the Papa Bear called 
the little Cub Bear very early, and told him that he 
would like to have him go out again that day, and 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 137 


that if he would be very careful he could go farther 
than he had ever gone before. 

So this time the little Cub Bear went a long, long 
way, and came to a place he had never been before, 
either with his papa or without him, and there was 
a great oak tree, and he saw high up in this tree 
little squirrels running about on the limbs of the 
trees, with their bushy tails over their backs. And 
the little Cub Bear, after he had found something to 
eat, came back and watched the squirrels, and he 
saw that they were gathering nuts and carrying 
them in their little paws into holes in the top of the 
tree. He noticed, too, that sometimes these little 
squirrels would sit on the end of the limb, just as the 
’coon did, and take in their little forepaws a nut and 
bite through the shell of the nut very quickly, and 
get out the meat and eat it. He thought this was 
very, very nice, but he wondered why they did not 
eat all the nuts, and why they took some of them in 
the hole of the tree. 

So that night, when he returned home, he talked 
to his papa about the little squirrels he had seen 
that day, with their beautiful bushy tails curling up 
over their backs, and their bright little eyes, and 
their sharp little teeth and soft fur; then he said: 

“Papa, why do the little squirrels take some of 
the nuts into the hole in the tree?” 

Papa Bear told him that it was because they were 
saving the nuts for the winter, when the snow was 


138 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


on the ground and there were no nuts to be had, and 
that the little squirrels spent all the winter time in¬ 
side the tree, where it was warm and cozy; and that 
whenever they were hungry, they had this store of 
nuts to eat, and that the little squirrels seemed to 
know whether it was going to be a long, hard win¬ 
ter, or whether the winter was going to be mild, and 
that they knew just how many nuts to put away for 
the winter, whether it was short or long. 

When it was night time, the little Cub Bear 
cuddled up in a ball and said: 

“Papa, I want you to tell me a story before I go to 
sleep, about the inside of a nice warm tree, where 
the squirrels live.” 

And so the Papa Bear told this story: 


THE PAPA BEAR’S LULLABY 


«f\NCE there was a big black papa bear, and he 
had a little black cub bear. They lived in the 
woods a long way from any one. The mamma bear 
had gone to the bear heaven, and so they lived alone. 

“One night, as it was getting very, very cold, the 
papa bear went a long, long way to find something 
to eat for the little bear, and he walked and walked 
until he was very tired; but he could not find any¬ 
thing to eat, for the snow had come and covered the 
ground, and all the berries were gone. 

“The papa bear grew more and more tired; he was 
so tired that as he walked his eyes would close, and 
he could not keep them open, and his head would 
nod so sleepily, but he kept on, hoping that he would 
soon find something to eat for his little cub bear. 

“So he walked and he walked. His eyes closed—he 
was so sleepy, sleepy, sleepy. Soon he started home, 
and walked, and walked, and walked, until he met 
the little cub bear, who had come out to meet him; 
and he said: 

“ ‘Dear little cub bear, I am so sleepy that I can 
not keep my eyes open at all.’ 

“And the little cub bear said, T am so sleepy that 
I can not keep my eyes open at all/ 

“Then the papa bear said, T am going to find you 
a nice place to sleep.’ 


139 


140 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


“So they walked, and walked, and got sleepier, and 
sleepier, until they came to a great hollow tree. 
Way up at the top of the tree was a hole large 
enough for the little cub bear to get in. The papa 
bear told the little cub to climb up the tree and go 
in the hole, and see if there was a good place in the 
tree to sleep. 

“The little cub did as his papa told him to; he 
climbed up and up until he came to the hole in the 
top of the tree, and then he looked into the hole to 
see if there was a good place in the tree for him to 
climb down on the inside. The little cub bear turned 
around and backed into the hole, and soon the papa 
bear could see nothing of the little cub bear, for he 
was inside the tree. But he could hear him scratch 
as he slid down on the inside of the tree. 

“The papa bear listened, as he stood outside of the 
tree on the ground, and he could hear the little cub’s 
claws scratch, scratch, scratch. And he listened 
again, and he could hear the little cub bear’s claws 
scratch, scratch, scratch. And he listened again, but 
he couldn’t hear anything. And he listened, and he 
couldn’t hear anything. And he wondered, and 
wondered, where the little cub was. 

“So he listened again. This time he heard a faint 
sound, just inside the tree, and he knew that the lit¬ 
tle cub bear was clear down inside the tree at the 
bottom. 

“The papa bear said, 'Go to sleep, dear little cub.’ 


HOW THE CIRCUS CAME TO VISIT THEM 141 


"The little cub lay down in the bottom of the hol¬ 
low tree, and curled up into a little ball and closed 
his eyes. It was a nice, warm, soft, sleepy place. 
And the papa on the outside heard the little bear 
lie down, and so he listened and listened. And soon 
he heard the softest little snore. Just the softest 
snore. 

“And then the papa bear went a little farther, and 
found another hollow tree, and he climbed up, and 
up, until he came to a big hole in the top of the big 
tree, and he backed into the hole and scratched his 
way down and down inside the hollow tree, until he 
came to the bottom, and then he rolled himself up 
into a big, black ball, so snug and warm, and went 
to sleep. 

“He snored so quietly, and the little cub bear and 
the papa bear slept all winter long in the cozy warm 
hollow trees, but once in a while the papa bear 
would climb up, and up, out of the tree and go over 
to the little cub’s tree, and listen, and he would hear 
the faintest little snore, so gentle. 

“And then the papa bear would say, ‘Dear little 
cub, I love you,’ and pat the tree. 

“Then he would go back to his own hollow tree, up 
and up he would climb outside, and down and down 
inside, until he came to the nice warm place where 
his bed was. 

“There he would curl up into a ball, and shut his 
eyes, and go to sleep, and snore and snore and snore 


142 


THE BEAR FAMILY AT HOME 


all night, and all day, and all night, and all day, the 
whole winter long.” 

And the little cub was asleep before the story was 
ended, for, you see, the story has no end. 

Afterward many wonderful stories were told in 
the cave of Jimmie Bear, and many wonderful 
things happened to the animals there; but I think 
that we must say “Good-by” now to the dear little 
cub and to all of the animals. 

THE END 





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